The Copenhagen Post | Oct 12-18 by The Copenhagen Post

Compulsory military service could be cut

Michael Laudrup fights the Viasat curse

12 - 18 October 2012 | Vol 15 Issue 41

Sink your teeth into half-term fun

Denmark’s only English-language newspaper | cphpost.dk PETER STANNERS

NEWS

Government to distribute ‘overdose kits’ to drug users so they can act as their own first responders

NEWS

Access denied? Opposition builds to a new information access law that was banged out behind closed doors

7 NEWS

No action

Government promised they’d pursue dual citizenship, but it didn’t make the cut for this year’s agenda

Trade unions accuse the government of breaking its promise to earmark parental leave for new fathers

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Former biker claims to have infiltrated al-Qaeda RAY WEAVER

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Danish man says he was involved in plot that killed top terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki

HE NATIONAL intelligence agency PET was directly involved in the hunt for one of the world’s most wanted terrorist leaders – al-Qaeda’s Anwar al-Awlaki – before he was killed in a US drone attack in September of last year. Morten Storm, a 36-year-old PET agent working with the CIA, told Jyllands-Posten newspaper that he infiltrated al-Awlaki’s inner circle and was responsible for the series of events that led to the al-Qaeda leader’s demise. “I helped the CIA and PET track Anwar so the Americans could send a

drone after him,” Storm told JyllandsPosten. “That was the plan, which was created by the CIA and PET.” Storm said that he and al-Awlaki began trading messages via a USB memory stick at the beginning of September 2011. Messengers carried the memory stick back and forth between the two men. Shortly after the last time that Storm sent the stick back to al-Awlaki at the end of September last year, the alQaeda leader was tracked and killed by a US drone attack ordered by President Barack Obama. Storm said that he had been living a double life for a number of years. One life was led as Morten Storm, a PET agent who reported both to the CIA and PET, and a second was that of Murad Storm, a radical Muslim with terrorist friends.

“Many of my family and friends have believed for the past six years that I am a dedicated Islamist,” said Storm. “Now they know that I have been fighting terror.” Storm’s path into covert operations was a twisted one indeed. Born in the small Zealand town of Korsør, Storm was a troubled child who had a hard time adjusting in school. He committed his first armed robberies at the age of 13. He was in and out of jail during his teenage years, eventually becoming a member of the Bandidos biker gang. Following an arrest in June 1997, Storm renounced his life of drugs and violence and told his lawyer, family and friends that he was converting to Islam. By all appearances, Storm was serious about his new faith. After living

with another Danish convert in England, he moved to Yemen to study the Koran. While in Yemen, he married a Moroccan woman in 2000 and had a son he named Osama in 2002. It was during this time that his faith took a radical turn and he began communicating with radicals thought to be involved in terrorism. It was through them that Storm made contact with the American-born al-Awlaki. Storm said he eventually became disillusioned by the radical side of Islam. “I found out that what I believed in was, unfortunately, not what I thought it was,” he said. In the winter of 2006, Storm said he contacted PET and said he would help

Morten Storm continues on page 6

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Week in review

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

CPH Post Word of the Week:

12 - 18 October 2012 THE WEEK’S MOST READ STORIES AT CPHPOST.DK

Værnepligt (noun) – Compulsory military service. Where you heard it: The government proposed cutting the compulsory service as a way to make the Defence Ministry achieve its required budget cuts (see opposite page) Scanpix / Martin Sylvest Andersen

Please let it end

Police pepperspray 15-month-old Dating the Danes | Boys who can shave Former biker infiltrated al-Qaeda Kate’s boobs coming to Denmark The Danish language’s irritable vowel syndrome

FROM OUR ARCHIVES TEN YEARS AGO. Copenhagen Mayor Jens Kramer Mikkesen calls for the formation of a new Danish-Swedish council in Øresund. FIVE YEARS AGO. Police make a record 436 arrests at a non-violent demonstration in support of the Ungdomshuset youth collective. ONE YEAR AGO. Work begins on a three-year project to rebuild Nørreport Station, Denmark’s busiest transportation hub. The election to see who will replace Villy Søvndal as Socialistisk Folkeparti leader will finally be held on Saturday, leading to hopes that the weeks-long endless media coverage will finally end once either Astrid Krag (left) or Annette Vilhelmsen (right) claims the post

for specific funding details about 87 different museums. Nørby’s actions were quickly interpreted as vindictive. Given that the Culture Ministry is obliged to answer all the questions, Nørby’s 696 questions were enormously burdensome. Nørby later acknowledged that “the connection to my mother looks stupid”.

Denmark’s only English-language newspaper Since 1998, The Copenhagen Post has been Denmark’s leading source for news in English. As the voice of the international community, we provide coverage for the thousands of foreigners making their home in Denmark. Additionally, our English language medium helps to bring Denmark’s top stories to a global audience. In addition to publishing the only regularly printed English-language newspaper in the country, we provide up-to-date news on our website and deliver news to national and international organisations. The Copenhagen Post is also a leading provider of non-news services to the private and public sectors, offering writing, translation, editing, production and delivery services.

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No euro

Danish faith in the European dream is at an all-time low, according to a survey carried out by TNS Gallup. Only 22 percent of Danes would back the notion of accepting the euro as a national currency. This is in stark contrast to a similar survey from 2011, in which 41 percent of the population welcomed the idea of

President and Publisher Ejvind Sandal Chief Executive Jesper Nymark Editor-in-Chief Kevin McGwin Managing Editor Ben Hamilton News Editor Justin Cremer Journalists Peter Stanners, Ray Weaver & Christian Wenande

a single European currency. The survey caused Dansk Folkeparti’s party president, Kristian Thulsen Dahl, to call on the government to reconsider its position regarding the EU. “We simply need to accept that Danish citizens are getting fed up, and want to get off the merry-go-round,” he told Berlingske newspaper.

Editorial offices: Slagtehusgade 4 – 6 DK 1715 Copenhagen V Telephone: 3336 3300 Fax: 3393 1313 www.cphpost.dk News Desk news@cphpost.dk 3336 4243 The CPH Post welcomes outside articles and letters to the editor. Letters and comments can be left on our website or at: comments@cphpost.dk

Colourbox

Ellen Trane Nørby, Venstre’s culture spokesperson, was roundly mocked this week after bombarding the Culture Ministry with 696 questions about public support for museums after a religious art museum in Lemvig had its funding application rejected – a museum that her mother happened to sit on the board of. Nørby asked

Colourbox

Scanpix / KEld Navntoft

Ellen’s 696

Ten jobs

The union Dansk Metal sent a message out to 2,000 shop stewards across the country asking them to find work for the more than 1,600 union members slated to lose unemployment benefits at the start of the year, when the benefits period is cut from two to four years. Of the 883 companies that responded, 836 reported they

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had no openings. The other 47 companies were able to round up a total of ten jobs or apprenticeships. The head of Dansk Metal, Torben Poulsen, said the figures show that benefits should be extended until the economy turns around. Nearly 16,000 workers are scheduled to lose unemployment benefits on January 1.

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News

12 - 18 October 2012

Government proposes ending compulsory military service PETER STANNERS Half a billion kroner could be saved by ending compulsory military service for 18-year-olds but opposition opposes the move

ompulsory military service may be suspended in order to help the Ministry of Defence find the 2.7 billion kroner in budget cuts it has promised to make. The proposal was floated on Sunday ahead of Monday’s negotiations between the government and the parties that voted in favour of the last defence budget that expires in two years time. According to Berlingske newspaper, most of the negotiations have so far been held in private. Politicians have since June had time to mull over a report from the Ministry of Defence that outlined four different scenarios to find the 2.7 billion kroner of cuts. Two of the scenarios suggest suspending compulsory military service to provide 500 million kroner of savings. Compulsory military service is written into the Danish constitution, making it difficult to abolish. That is why the government has instead proposed to suspend the tradition. Suspending the service, however, is strongly opposed by opposition parties Konservative (K) and Dansk Folkeparti (DF). “We believe that military service creates a good recruitment ground for the military and ensures a good connection between society and the military,” DF’s defence spokesperson, Maria Krarup, told the

Ritzau news bureau. “If we suddenly need more troops [in the future], it would be easy to increase their numbers if we had national service.” K’s defence spokesperson, Lene Espersen, completely ruled out supporting any new budget that suspends national service. “We want to keep national service and will not agree to a defence budget that de facto abolishes it,” Espersen told Ritzau. “This is an ultimate demand and we will not compromise.” Libertarian opposition party, Liberal Alliance (LA), supports suspending it, however. “National service belongs to the past,” LA’s defence spokesperson Villum Christensen told Ritzau. “It’s a very expensive way to educate soldiers. We would rather have a professional army.” Traditionally, parliamentary agreements about the defence and the military are made with as broad a consensus as possible. If DF and K continue their opposition to suspending military service, the defence minister, Nick Hækkerup (Socialdemokraterne), will have to find the money elsewhere. And by Tuesday, Hækkerup seemed to be open to the idea of shutting barracks instead in order to close the budget hole. “We shouldn’t close barracks simply for the sake of closing barracks,” he told Ritzau. “But when we start saving, we will probably end up with a surplus of facilities because we have so many barracks.” The cuts to the defence budget will have consequences for the future capacities of the Danish military and its ability to

Military service • 5,067 people did their national service in 2011. Only 9.5 percent were women. • All Danish men residing in Denmark are automatically called into an introduction day when they turn 18, at which they take a test and have their health tested. • Those that pass the health test can choose to pull a number to see if they have to serve the national service. If the number chosen is above a predetermined threshold, they do not have to serve. • If you choose to join voluntarily without being drafted in the numbers system, you can choose where to serve in the country. Otherwise, you are assigned a department – either navy, army or air force. • National service is a minimum of four months. Source: Forsvaret / Ritzau participate in future international missions, such as the current Danish contribution to the ISAF forces in Afghanistan. Selected 18-year-old Danish men – and a small number of women – serve at least four months of military service once they complete upper secondary school. The tradition started in the middle of the 19th century and is now considered a rite of passage for most men, while also providing the Danish military with a large recruitment ground for its professional army.

Allies to be snubbed in budget negotiations Christian Wenande Deal with Venstre would mark second time this year the government turns to the opposition to pass key legislation

he government is deep into negotiations with opposition party Venstre (V) in its bid to secure support for the 2013 budget, financial daily Børsen reports. The surprising collaboration hinges on the government accepting V’s demand that proposed social welfare reforms be a part of the budget. Both parties, according to Børsen, seem willing to accommodate each other’s demands. John Dyrby Paulsen, the Socialdemokraterne (S) finance spokesperson, didn’t reject the notion of co-operating with V, but he said that it may be difficult to agree where the money saved should be spent. “If the agreement leads to a social welfare reform within this parliamentary year, then it could be acceptable,” Paulsen told Børsen. “It sounds like a challenge,

but let’s see how far we get at the negotiation table.” Social welfare reform is, along with the reform of student benefits and state-funded sick pay, forecast to generate about three billion kroner, and V wants to use some of those funds to finance tax rollbacks on businesses, including removing the fat tax and maintaining the tax discount for Danes working abroad. “It’s the goals that are the most essential aspect here. How we use the various financial elements is not as pertinent. Money has no colour,” V’s finance spokesperson Peter Christensen told Børsen. But if the government agrees with V to keep the tax discount for Danes working abroad, it will be heading for a political collision with its coalition partner, Socialistisk Folkeparti (SF), which has been pushing to slash it. If the deal with V were to go through, it would mark the second time this year the government has snubbed its ally Enhedslisten (EL) to enter into an agreement with its main rival. The far-left EL’s disaffection

with the government was ratcheted up a notch earlier this month when the prime minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt (S), delivered an address to the opening session of parliament that appeared to underscore her disinterest in increasing unemployment benefits. On Monday, Frank Aaen, the EL finance spokesperson, said an agreement with V would not get his party’s vote and that the unemployment benefit issue would be an “ultimate demand” for the party. But on Tuesday, Johanne Schmidt-Nielsen, the party’s spokesperson, softened that message. “We must solve the unemployment benefit problem. I don’t think that’s such a massive demand. We have proposed a job guarantee, but it’s not an ultimate demand. We only demand that we find a solution. If the government has other ideas, they can present them,” Schmidt-Nielsen told public broadcaster DR. The negotiations for next year’s budget commenced on Tuesday evening.

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Cover story

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Dual citizenship delayed at least another year Photos. Peter Stanners

Peter Stanners The government says it is still considering the best way to follow through with its promise to allow dual citizenship, though some are frustrated by the delay

law to allow dual citizenship was not included in the law catalogue for this parliamentary year, which was published last week. The delay to the legislation is a blow to thousands who are caught between Denmark and a second country that permits dual citizenship. In certain circumstances, Danes can be born dual citizens, but they cannot go on to obtain a second citizenship later in life without forfeiting their Danish citizenship. Likewise, foreigners wanting a Danish passport must first forfeit their original citizenship before becoming Danish. The current legislation has been criticised for being too restrictive as foreigners living in Denmark often want to retain a connection to their country of birth, despite also committing to a new life in Denmark. Danes living abroad also suffer. Many are unwilling to give up their Danish citizenship in order to take on the nationality of a host country that they have lived in for many years. In both cases, the result is that people remain frozen out of public services and political engagement in Russian national Tatiana Divakova has been in Denmark for over 20 years and would like to become a citizen – but not if it means cutting ties with Mother Russia the countries that they have chosen to politicians are properly informed. reside in because they are unwilling to Divakova said. Travel is the major problem Diva“Of course, we at Danes Worldcompletely cut ties with their country kova faces. She just sent her passport to wide are impatient about dual citizenof heritage. ship finally becoming a reality, but on Tatiana Divakova moved to Den- the Russian consulate in Stockholm in the other hand we’re also patient. Dual mark from Russia with her husband in order to get a five-year visa for the UK citizenship is a particularly important 1990. He works for the World Health at a cost of around 6,500 kroner. It’ll be issue for thousands of Danes and must Organisation, while Divakova is an en- six weeks before she finds out whether it will be granted. be treated as such.” trepreneur. She said Last October, when The Justice Ministry confirmed to that having Danish the new government The Copenhagen Post that the law alcitizenship would announced its support lowing dual nationality was still taking improve her life, but for dual citizenship, shape. she would never cut The Copenhagen Post “The government is still considerties with Russia in I have a relationship spoke to Tina Thuesen, ing various models of the layout of dual order to achieve it. with my country, a member of the dual citizenship due to the fact that dual “I could have citizenship campaign citizenship has many complicated, judilegally taken Dan- my culture and my group Statsborger.dk, cial implications that we need consider ish citizenship long thoroughly,” a ministry official said in ago, but I don’t want relatives. I like Russia – about why dual citizenan email, adding that the government to give up my Rus- it’s my country, so why ship was so important With no second passport, Divakova has to rely on her old tattered resident permit to Danes and nonhad until the end of its four-year term sian citizenship, so I Switzerland, where she has lived for the over the years. Danes alike. to introduce the new law. can’t do it,” Divako- should I give it up? Since then, Thuesen past 20 years. “We spent a lot of time “Our main contribution has been Despite the disappointment that va said, adding that and statsborger.dk have this spring talking to legal experts in providing these different cases that a dual citizenship law would not be she regularly travels to and from Russia where most of her worked with the Justice Ministry to the Ministry of Justice about how such demonstrate the different circumstances passed in the next 12 months, Thuesen help develop the change to the law. She a law would affect both Danes living in which a lack of dual citizenship is a said she and her organisation would family still lives. “I have a relationship with my was disappointed to discover, however, abroad and foreigners living in Den- problem,” spokesperson Øivind Holter- keep up the pressure. mann said. “We have come so far, and I’m opcountry, my culture and my relatives. that the law was not included in this mark.” The government also consulted the Holtermann added that Danes timistic the law will change: it’s just a I like Russia – it’s my country, so why year’s parliamentary agenda. “The impression I got from speak- Danish expat association Danes World- Worldwide was prepared for the govern- matter of time. I know that the work should I give it up? But I also live here, and my daughter was born here and ing to different politicians was that the wide about the benefits of allowing dual ment to take its time developing the law, has been done, but the government has she has plenty of Danish friends. We new law would be presented to parlia- citizenship by referring to the many case arguing that there are only benefits to be so many other problems that obviously have a real connection to Denmark,” ment this autumn,” Thuesen said from studies the organisation has collected had by being thorough and making sure they don’t have room for us right now.”

Online this week Parents accused of raping their daughter and her friends A husband and wife from Aalborg, aged 33 and 34 respectively, have been charged with sexually abusing four girls – including their own daughter – between the ages of 12 and 14. The court in the northern Jutland has set aside nine days to hear the case of the couple. The details of the accusations in

the case are ugly. The mother is accused of tying up two of the girls, hanging them in the air by their legs and then watching as the father raped them. Another girl was said to have been raped multiple times by the father, who threatened her with violence if she did not comply with his demands.

Another year at NATO helm for Rasmussen Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s contract as the secretary-general of NATO has been extended for another year. The 28 NATO nations voted unanimously last week on Wednesday to give him a one-year extension when his first term as NATO chief expires on 1 August next year. The former prime minister is

now slated to hold the top post until 1 August 2014. Rasmussen was recently quoted as saying he would take on another year if his NATO colleagues so desired. The job as NATO chief generally runs for four years, with the possibility of renewal. Rasmussen is the first Dane to lead the alliance.

School shooting threat closes Odense school A threatening letter delivered to Tietgenskolen in Odense led to a large scale police operation on Wednesday morning. The printed letter was opened at 7:46 on Wednesday morning and contained an anonymous threat that there would be a

school shooting. The emergency services were called and large numbers of police descended on the school, which was then cordoned off and emptied of staff while pupils were called and told to remain at home as the police investigated.

Read the full stories at cphpost.dk

News

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

‘Overdose kits’ to be distributed to drug users

Ray Weaver

The opposition is sceptical of a new government plan to help drug addicts save one another before the ambulance arrives

With churches refusing to bury non-members, family members are left searching for alternatives

Colourbox

Upon death, former church members are all dressed up with no place to go

s more and more Danes are opting out of membership of the Church of Denmark (folkekirken), the family members left behind when one of them dies often receive another nasty shock in the midst of their grief when they discover there is no place for their loved one in the local cemetery. “I had a client who had no idea that her husband had opted out of the church,” Bente Lorenzen, the director of a Vejle funeral home, told Politiken newspaper. “She was completely distraught that her local priest would not perform her husband’s funeral.” Even when the survivors are aware that the deceased was not a church member, they are often surprised when the church says ‘no’ to performing a funeral ceremony. Mogens Balling of the national funeral association Landsforeningen Liv&Død said that families often panic when they find out a church burial is not

For those who have left the church, a burial plot can be pricey

possible. The families are often not aware of what other options may be available. Bishop Anders Gadegaard from Vor Frue Church in Copenhagen is also the head of the Danish Council of Churches. He said that when priests hear from a distraught family, they should talk with them to see if a church service is appropriate. Gadegaard said that the dead should be buried using a ceremony that represents their beliefs ... or the lack thereof. Non-

Christian ceremonies conducted in a chapel by a funeral director are often available. Opting out of the church can also cost survivors a bit of cash when their loved one passes away. Burying a casket at Kristrup cemetery in Randers is free for church members, but costs nearly 14,500 kroner for a nonmember. In Helsingør, church members pay just over 4,500 kroner to be permanently planted in the church cemetery, while non-

members – or their relatives – are forced to fork out nearly 13,000 kroner for the same privilege. The price for a burial in larger cities like Copenhagen, Odense or Aalborg, where the cemeteries are owned by local authorities, tend to be the same for both church members and non-members. Inge Lise Pedersen, the head of Danske Menighedsråd, the national parish association, had no problem with the price discrepancy in smaller towns and villages. “It is fair that those who have not contributed to the church pay full price,” Pedersen told Politiken. “Church members should get a discount.” Pedersen expressed no sympathy for those families where the husband – usually the family member with the highest income – has left the church while the wife remained a member. “She shows up when he dies, wringing her hands to the priest saying that he never intended to leave the church. Well, he did leave,” said Pedersen. During the first half of 2012, nearly 12,000 Danes left folkekirken – almost as many as the 13,000 who left during the whole of 2011.

PM’s approach to tackling forced marriages criticised Instilling Danish cultural beliefs at an early age will do more to tackle forced marriages than tightening law, critics say

M Helle Thorning-Schmidt (Socialdemokraterne) argued in her opening speech in parliament last week that the punishment needs to be raised for forced marriages, which remain a national problem. “We need to show the young people that we are on their side,” Thorning-Schmidt told parliament. “The government will increase the punishment for [those who arrange] forced marriages.”

Despite the PM’s support of the victims of forced and arranged marriages, her method for tackling the problem was criticised. According to Berlingske newspaper, not a single conviction for forced marriages has been made since the former government increased the punishment from two to four years in 2008. A major problem is that many are held in private and are not registered with the Danish authorities making them invalid and not covered by the antiforced-marriage legislation. If the number of women seeking help is used as a guide, forced marriages are a growing

problem in Denmark. According to the association of women’s crisis centres, LOKK, the number of women seeking help – either because of a pending forced marriage or the threat of one – rose six-fold between 2005 and 2010 from 101 women to 660. Thomas V Larsen, the head of the pro-integration organisation Center of Positiv Integration, argued that instead of tightening the law, the government should focus on changing cultural beliefs from an early age. “To end arranged marriages, you need to focus in primary school on the message that people should have the freedom to

choose whom they want to marry,” Larsen told Berlingske. And City Council member Lars Aslan Rasmussen (Socialdemokraterne) argued that the government should instead focus their attention on Muslim imams. “If an imam is a Danish citizen and forces young people to get married, he should have his right to perform marriages taken from him. If he is not a Danish citizen, he should be deported,” Rasmussen told Berlingske. Rasmussen also supported forcing imams to take part in official training courses to teach them about the law regarding arranged marriages. (PS)

Christian Wenande

rom the beginning of next year, the government will launch a new initiative in the struggle against drugrelated deaths. In collaboration with far-left support party Enhedslisten (EL), the government has decided to set aside six million kroner for so-called ‘overdose kits’ that are intended to aid hardcore drug abusers. The kit will contain revival equipment and doses of the drug Naloxon, which is used to counter the effects of an opiate overdose. Should an overdose occur, the kits are to be administered by fellow drug addicts until the arrival of the ambulance. The City Council has provided overdose kits to drub abusers as part of a trial and according to the health minister, Astrid Krag (Socialistisk Folkeparti), the results have been positive. “Our experience is that it really made a difference and that’s why we’ve decided to act on it now. We’ve already established an injection room and I expect that this will also have an effect,” Krag told Politiken newspaper. Only recently, the state announced that ‘heroin pills’ aimed at reducing overdoses, injuries and incidences of cancer would be available in 2013. Just last week, the country’s first stationary injection room opened up for business in Vesterbro on October 1. Copenhagen’s deputy mayor for social affairs, Mikkel Warming (EL), has also indicated that he hopes to have injection rooms established in Nørrebro, Nordvest and Amager in the future. Denmark continues to rank highly in Europe when it comes to drug-related mortality, and the number of deaths continues to rise. There were 252 deaths in 2002 and 273 in 2010 – the

vast majority of which were overdoses. Stine Brix, the health spokesperson for EL, maintained that the overdose kits were to be integrated into the current treatment programme. “It’s important to join the two programmes so that these survival packages don’t stand alone. This is about harm reduction for the most vulnerable abusers so it’s a collective effort,” Brix told Politiken. But the new strategy has been met with scepticism by the opposition, who contend that the funds could have been spent more wisely. “Many of the people that die inject alone, and that’s why I doubt that this initiative will work in the real world. If you’re with someone who ODs, you can call 112 for an ambulance who will administer the antidote,” Tom Behnke, a spokesperson for Konservative, told Politiken. “I won’t oppose it if it has an effect, but the money could have been used in a better way.” Besides the kits, there is 2 million kroner set aside to investigate drug-related deaths and to ascertain whether the abuser had been in contact with the authorities and to what degree before their death. Similar studies in Norway have indicated that the majority of druginduced deaths occur at home, conveying that the injection room alone is inadequate. “The studies point to new initiatives with new knowledge. They cater to saving the lives of some of the most vulnerable citizens in Denmark,” Krag told Politiken. Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt (Socialdemokratene) pledged to provide more assistance to the nation’s hardluck residents during her opening parliamentary speech on Tuesday and the funds for the new initiatives stem from this year’s financial budget. It is estimated that there are about 33,000 drug users in Denmark, 13,000 of whom are injection users.

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News

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Thousands protest against Mohammed film in front of US Embassy Christian Wenande

Christian Wenande Large gathering remains peaceful; heavy police presence does not have to respond to any trouble

housands of people turned up in Østerbro on a windy Sunday afternoon to take part in a peaceful demonstration against the controversial film ‘Innocence of Muslims’ that has catalysed much recent violence and unrest. A similar demonstration was held at the same location three weeks ago. The demonstrators had congregated next to Parken Stadium on Øster Allé in Østerbro before slowly walking up towards the Trianglen intersection. From there they turned down Østerbrogade and continued to Dag Hammarskjölds Allé, where the US Embassy is located. The procession was led by a small truck from which a man with a megaphone shouted various slogans similar to those on the signs toted by the people following behind. “We approve of freedom of speech, but not to the abuse of it,” “Insult belongs to an uncivilised society,” “Live in peace and let others lie in peace,” and “Freedom of speech with responsibility” were some of the messages conveyed by the protesters, many of whom also carried Danish flags. The speaker criticised the US and the UN for permitting a film that was

Although upwards of 3,000 people participated in the demonstration, event spokesperson Shahzad Akram (right) said he expected even more

a “visual and verbal form of terrorism [that] threatened peace and provided fodder to radicals”. The long line of demonstrators, who were escorted by the police, stretched out for several hundred metres. The women holding up the rear were separated from the men, as was the case three weeks ago when the Scandinavian wing of the Islamic political organisation Hizb-ut-

Tahrir organised a similar demonstration in front of the embassy denouncing the ‘Innocence of Muslims’. But although there was a vehicle driving around with a Hizb-ut-Tahrir banner, event spokesman Shahzad Akram told The Copenhagen Post that Hizb-ut-Tahrir was not involved in organising Sunday’s rally. Akram further indicated that the

2-3,000 people present was a considerably lower number than he had predicted, blaming blustery winds and insufficient promotion of the event. “We had expected about 5,000 or 6,000 people today, but the demonstration wasn’t promoted very well, so many people didn’t know about it,” Akram said. “Generally we are here to demonstrate people’s right to express themselves, but

to do so without insulting others.” The police had turned up en masse, but were not forced into employing their dozen or so riot vans that were parked outside the US Embassy. As was the case three weeks ago, the US Embassy warned US citizens in Denmark to stay away from the embassy, while its employees had been instructed to do the same.

new proposed change to the nation’s media laws could have direct implications for broadcasting on radio and television, according to the national journalists’ union, Dansk Journalistforbund, and the national media association, Danske Medier. The new legislation would revoke the broadcast licence of any media organisation accused of supporting any form of terrorism. The proposed addition to the law would include wording that stipulates that “programmes should in no way be affiliated to any form of terror organisation(s)”. Christina Moshøj, a senior consultant for Danske Medier, strongly condemned the move, claiming that such a ban would especially restrict documentary programmes. “Documentaries should be able to pursue controversial issues that are within the public interest, without having to worry about possible prosecution,” Moshøj told Politiken newspaper. “At what point is a documentary programme an objective reflection or reality, and at what point do you say it contains elements of support for terrorism?” The spokesperson for Dansk Journalistforbund, Mogens Bjerregård, is also worried about the possible implications the proposed change would have on press freedom in Denmark. “Editors should have the final say as to which stories are broadcast or not,” he told Politiken. “That’s the foundation for press freedom. The more we look to the judicial system for guidance, the less freedom we’ll have to broadcast.” The proposed legislation follows

Scanpix / Bax Lindhardt

National media association says that proposed changes to media law will cause significant “collateral damage”

Jyllands-posten

New terror laws threaten press freedom

In an interview with Jyllands-Posten, Morten Storm revealed details of his double life

Morten Storm The proposed law change is seen as a way to close the loophole that allowed Roj TV to maintain its broadcast licence after it was found guilty of violating anti-terror laws

the failed attempt by the government to shut down the Kurdish television broadcasting service, Roj TV, which is based in Copenhagen. Roj TV was fined 2.6 million kroner in January for violating anti-terror laws, but continues to air its programmes thanks to a loophole in the current media law. The new wording of the media laws would close this particular loophole, but Bjerregård was adamant that the government is taking the wrong approach. “There are already established laws that work. You have to use regulations which are already in place,” he said. “This is just the wrong way to handle the situation.” Danske Medier’s Moshøj agreed with Bjerregård, although she was sympathetic to the government’s attempts to tackle support for terrorism. “We just feel that this proposed law doesn’t have the right balance,” she said. “It will curb terrorist propaganda, but there’s a real risk of collateral damage.” Oluf Jørgensen, the head of research

for media law at the journalism school Journalisthøjskole, on the other hand, disagreed. He’s not convinced that the proposed change will have any real effect on Denmark’s press freedom. “Under current legislation, programmes are prohibited from creating bias depending on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion and nationality,” Jørgensen told Politiken. “Now, sympathy towards terrorism is included in that list. But it won’t change very much because if you support the cause of a terrorist organisation, then you’re typically supporting a particular ethnic group anyway.” “On the surface, this legislation sounds like it could affect many broadcasters,” he continued. “But the freedom to information and of expression in this country protects the right to cover world stories in the public’s interest. Objectivity is not under threat.” Jørgensen was therefore adamant that the newly proposed law will only strengthen the media’s rights rather than hinder them. (BS)

continued from front page

them combat terrorism by using the trust he had built up with the radical Islamists. The CIA claims that the action that killed al-Awlaki was not a joint mission between the CIA and PET, but that the two agencies were engaged in parallel activities. An audio recording from October of last year seems to refute the CIA version, however. A CIA agent can be heard talking about the joint mission and the role played by Storm. “We had our team, we had the entire project in place, and you [Storm] played the highest role,” the agent says. The agent can be heard saying that US President Obama was aware of Storm and his contribution to the mission. Jakob Scharf, the head of PET, would not comment directly on whether Storm was involved in any operation, telling DR News only that PET “did not contribute during the military operation that led to the killing of alAwlaki in Yemen”. Some are calling on the justice

minister, Morten Bødskov (Socialdemokraterne), to examine if Storm’s alleged participation in the plot to kill alAwlaki are even legal under Danish law. “We demand an explanation of what happened and what rules the minister believes that PET has followed,” Enhedslisten’s spokesperson Pernille Skipper told Politiken newspaper. “PET should not target a criminal to kill him rather than capture him and bring him to justice. If the purpose of the attack was to kill al-Awlaki, then it is deeply problematic that PET was involved.” Bødskov refused to comment and referred all questions to PET. Storm, for his part, had no doubt that he did the right thing, saying: “I am proud of the work that I have done.” Terror experts, however, have warned that Storm has now made himself a target. Mehdi Mozaffari, a professor of Islamic radicalisation at Aarhus University, told Ekstra Bladet tabloid that Storm is likely to become one of al-Qaeda’s top Danish targets, following JyllandsPosten’s editor Flemming Rose, who published the Mohammed caricatures in 2005, and Kurt Westergaard, the cartoonist behind the most inflammatory of the caricatures.

News

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Opposition builds to freedom of information law Colourbox

Peter Stanners Three parties raise concern that the new freedom of information law will limit access to government documents that could reveal corruption and the abuse of power

pposition is building to the new information access law, offentlighedslov, which was agreed upon this week by the government and opposition parties Konservative and Venstre. The new law will place limitations on what government documentation the press and general public are entitled to access through freedom of information requests. Despite the consensus between the five parties that negotiated the changes, the three remaining parties – Liberal Alliance (LA), Dansk Folkeparti (DF) and Enhedslisten (EL) – are demanding that the new law be subject to a proper debate before it is presented in parliament in February. “The government parties have made a U-turn and now apparently have no problem hiding ministerial work when they themselves are in power,” Pernille Skipper, EL’s legal spokesperson, told public broadcaster DR. “It is embarrassing, and it is all the more embarrassing because they have not bothered to have an open debate and negotiate with all the parties in parliament.” The new offentlighedslov will limit access to the calendars of ministers and civil servants as well as documentation passed between ministries and govern-

The public’s access to government information will be limited by the new law

The government parties ... apparently have no problem hiding ministerial work when they themselves are in power ment officials that were used to make decisions. Simon Emil Ammitzbøll, a spokesperson for LA, added that the new limitations would allow the government and civil servants to better cover up cases of corruption and the abuse of power.

Krøyers Plads

“In a democracy, it is fundamentally necessary that the general population has the opportunity to know what the people in power are getting up to, and that will be limited by this deal,” Ammitzbøll told DR. “It is doubtful that some of the most important recent journalistic exposures would have been possible with the new law.” Information newspaper compiled a list of some of the scandals of the past 12 months that would never have been exposed under the new offentlighedslov. Among them was the ‘taxgate’ scandal involving PM Helle ThorningSchmidt (Socialdemokraterne) and her husband, Steven Kinnock. The scandal started after Politiken newspaper revealed last November that in 2010, Peter Loft, a department head in the Tax Ministry, had held five meet-

ings with the head of the Copenhagen office of the tax agency, Skat. In one of the meetings, it was alleged that Loft urged Skat to investigate claims that Kinnock owed Danish tax. The revelation was made after Politiken was granted access to the calendars of top civil servants in Skat and was significant because it demonstrated that the Tax Ministry had illegally tried to interfere in a specific case. Information alleges that a scandal like this would not be exposed under the new offentlighedslov because the calendars of top civil servants would be exempt from freedom of information requests. That was confirmed by Oluf Jørgensen, the head of media law research at Danmarks Medie og Journalisthøjskole and an expert on information access laws. “It’s thought-provoking that a new exception is being added to information access law that, if it had been applied earlier, would have prevented the exposure of a very important case of abuse of power,” Jørgensen told Information. The updated law was not roundly condemned, however, and many aspects have been praised for catching up with the times by allowing, for example, freedom of information requests to be submitted online. Proponents of the controversial aspects of the new law argue that limiting insight into documentation, which is passed between civil servants and ministries, will allow for a more free exchange of ideas before final decisions are made and reduce the fear that nascent ideas are seized by the media through freedom of information requests.

Trainee doctors forced to teach themselves

nspections at Herlev Hospital’s orthopaedic ward revealed that trainee doctors are performing emergency procedures they are not sufficiently trained to carry out. According to metroXpress newspaper, worried trainee doctors contacted the Sundhedsstyrelsen health authority, which launched an investigation and confirmed stories of insufficient training. One trainee doctor, who spoke to metroXpress on the condition of anonymity, explained that pressure to bring down waiting times meant senior doctors had less time to spend with the trainees. “When there are only two doctors in the emergency room, you can’t ask for time,” the doctor said. “You might get some kind advice, but both doctors cannot abandon what they are doing because the trainee doctor doesn’t know how to do something. The only thing you can hope for is that an older colleague stays on after work to teach you. It’s a problem of time.” Lisbeth Lintz, the chairman of the trainee doctors association, Yngre Læger, told metroXpress that standards need to be raised. “It is unacceptable that newly-educated doctors are left alone in situations where they need help from older colleagues to treat a patient,” Lintz said. “It can affect the patient’s treatment, which is why it is important that this problem is tackled immediately.” (PS)

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OPINION

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

A victim of peace

12- 18 October 2012

Serbian question should top Denmark’s EU agenda

Eliminating the draft will allow the military to focus on the mission of fighting, not cultivating an outdated notion of citizensoldiers

nickname can say a lot about the person who bears it. But nicknames can also say something about the person who bestows them. In the Danish military, for example, it’s telling that new recruits are often nicknamed according to the part of the country they come from. The reasoning goes that doing so would make it easier for officers to find soldiers in their units with knowledge of a specific part of the country, should they find themselves operating there. A tradition that continues until this day, indentifying soldiers with a specific part of Denmark no doubt instils a sense of patriotism at a time when military missions have seemingly very little do with national security. However, it also says a lot about just how outdated the idea of conscription has become. With the end of the Cold War, the Danish military – like those in most other Western countries – has had a more important role to play operating abroad than defending the fatherland. In the Danish case, defence forces have served in the Balkans, Iraq, Afghanistan, over Libya and off the coast of Somalia, just to name some of the more prominent missions. None of the personnel deployed on any of these international missions, however, are conscripts. While Denmark on paper is a conscript military, the country in reality has two types of service members: conscripts, who are left at home to defend the borders from a theoretical enemy, and professional soldiers, who are an increasingly important tool of the nation’s foreign and security policy. In a world of limited budgets and increasingly demanding foreign operations, it’s hard to see the justification for continuing to spend 500 million kroner annually to keep a conscript army standing ready to fight an enemy that doesn’t exist – not least when 95 percent of the 5,000 new recruits each year are volunteers anyway. While it’s unlikely that all of those recruits would volunteer for long-term military service, even if a fraction did so, it would be a significant addition to a military that counts 20,000 active professional soldiers. Historians agree that adopting conscription was essential to the development of a modern army that was prepared to defend the nation’s borders. But that was in 1804. Here in 2012, success on the battlefield requires a new modern approach to filling the ranks of the nation’s military.

ERIK BOEL

ERBIANS ARE permitted to travel to the EU without a visa, and Serbia is a candidate to join the union. Nevertheless, it would appear that membership lies at the end of a long and winding path. As an EU official once explained in jest: Serbia will become an EU member during a Turkish presidency. A big roadblock is Kosovo which, despite declaring its independence in 2008, is still viewed by many Serbians as a part of their country. The EU has made normalised relations with Pristina a mandatory condition of Serbia’s EU membership. That includes things like a common border patrol, resolving telecommunications and power supply issues and carrying out any agreements the two parties have agreed on. At some point, Serbia may also have to pledge not to veto a Kosovan bid for EU membership,

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Roma. Unfortunately, these protections aren’t always extended to homosexuals, a trend we see elsewhere in eastern and central Europe. In 2010, anti-gay groups attacked the annual homosexual parade and a violent conflict between parade-goers and troublemakers erupted in central Belgrade. The biggest question, though, is what policies Serbia’s newly elected president and its newly seated government, which includes representatives from the right-wing Serbian Progress Party, will follow. So far, the rhetoric has been forward-looking. The government’s primary goal is EU membership. Progress, the Serbians understand, depends on whether or not the Serbian government can implement agreements with Kosovo and whether or not that relationship can develop. The nationalist government is by no means a group of softhearts, but as many Belgrade political commentators point out, hard-hearted politics may be what it takes to make the compromises EU membership requires, not least when it comes to Kosovo.

Given the chance, many young people would flee the country for greener pastures.

Regardless of how enormous Serbia’s problems are, the EU should set a date to begin negotiations with the country, and it should be a Danish priority to help this process along. It’s worth pointing out that beginning negotiations is far from actual accession. Turkey, for example, has been negotiating since 2005 without any real prospect of ever becoming a member. Still, a date could potentially help stabilise a corner of Europe where armed conflict still lurks in places like Kosovo and Macedonia. Setting a date to begin negotiations would also serve to bring Serbia out of its identity crisis. Ever since the downfall of Slobodan Milosevic, many Serbians have dreamt of a closer relationship with the Europe they feel they are a part of. Setting a date to begin negotiations will be a show of support for those working towards reconciliation and collaboration with each other and with neighbouring countries. The biggest benefit setting a negotiating date will have, however, will be to put pressure on Serbia to carry out crucial economic, political and social reforms. A Europeanised Serbia is in our interest – regardless of whether or not Serbia ever becomes a member of the EU. The author is president of Europa Bevægelsen (the Danish European Movement)

READER COMMENTS Police pepperspray 15-month old

Denmark’s only English-language newspaper

should the sovereignty at some point in the future seek to apply. Kosovo, though, is far from Serbia’s biggest hindrance to EU membership. The country’s economic problems are staggering, leaving many Serbians desperate. The figures tell a grim tale: 30 percent unemployment, 10 percent inflation and deep debt. Given the chance, many young people would flee the country for greener pastures. Working in Serbia’s favour is the relatively high education level of its populace, and Danish pump maker Grundfos reports positive experiences with the employees it has hired in Serbia. The country has a well-functioning infrastructure and there is – depending on which city you are in – strong support for foreign investment. Seen as a whole, Serbia’s economy is far better off than other countries in the region, including EU members Bulgaria and Romania. Slain PM Zoran Djindjic deserves much of the credit for the free and fair elections now held in Serbia. Freedom of speech is also widely respected. Minorities are by and large protected, be they Hungarians in the Vojvodina province, Romanians or

The thing is, if Homoud or his brothers had not actually attacked the police officer, and the police officer used pepper spray against Homoud, his brothers and his son, it follows that ... HE – the police officer – attacked THEM. With a WEAPON, too! Do you understand what that means? He did the opposite of protect innocent people. He is liable too, and I hope they bring that to bear in court. A good lawyer could and should get the Homoud family a good amount of money. And they deserve it too. loroferoz by website I think these situations are difficult to call. Obviously the officer did not intend to pepperspray a 15-monthold child. The cops are under a lot of pressure, especially in Nørrebro, and are only human. This also does sound like a language problem. The cop may well have felt threatened by three “large” men, and the men in question may not have fully understood police directions. As one commentator points out, police directives are generally nonnegotiable, and the fact that people increasingly think they are does not make enforcing the law any easier and contributes to this type of incident. I think all parties regret this situation getting out of hand, and, as the article states, police did their best to rectify the situation. paspatout by website

Just say “Put the kid down” and make the international hand signals for it. And then pepperspray. The idea that someone could be threatening while holding a child is strange. You should also apologise profusely when you accidentally spray a baby, not smirk about it with your buddies. Don’t give Danish police the benefit of the doubt here; they do not deserve it. Adventures and Japes by website Apologising is seen as a weakness around here – there is no way a cop will do that. There should be a full-scale inquiry into and review of police procedures as a result of this pathetically incompetent and dangerous piece of police work. I suspect this is part of a systematic failure and not just the case of an asshole cop gassing an infant. am2go by website Ya’ll know how dangerous those toddlers are. Why, he could have spit up all over that policeman’s uniform! Heather Alexander by Facebook Danish cliques a tough nut to crack I rather liked it when she said: “The reason [integration] is so slow is probably because we are a nation of peasants ...”! But, aside from that, I like that she recognises the prevailing, negative Danish attitude, and can stand there and say it, as a

Dane. A chink in the door, hopefully. Djeep by website

What a lovely lady! She is normal enough not to be Danish. theoldjanus by website

[Vestager] has nailed it. And I would like to have a text of her speech. If these few great remarks are representative of the rest, it’s a must-have … I have absolutely no problem with learning from the Danes – they have had success as a country so far and have many great traits. The big problem to solve for success to continue is for learning to go the other way, too. loroferoz by website

Denmark refuses to help USA with Guantanamo

Very good article. As a Dane who left Denmark when I was 19, and have stayed away for most of the time, I can only agree with most things being said here, and it will be Denmark’s downfall if they fail to interact with the rest of the world in a more positive way, in a way in which everything that’s different isn’t also a potential threat. Claus Andersen by Facebook One thing Danes need to learn is that there is no special way they should treat foreigners, and also that there are no foreigners in Denmark. We are all just people in the same geography. Until that sinks in, no conference, no initiative, no law will ever help. Because the mere act of labelling one as a foreigner is an alienating act. Marko Perisic by Facebook

What a joke! The US sets up a prison, kidnaps people from all over the world, detains them for years and finally admits a number are innocent and wants other nations to take them over. Even Søvndal is too smart for that… Thorvaldsen by website I’m not so sure. Denmark DID in fact collaborate with torture and war crimes by allowing the use of their air bases in Greenland. Isn’t it fair, then, that they assist in closing the prison and putting an end to something they helped create – particularly if they already made promises verbally? HeidiakaMissJibba by website Villy seems to have lost his ideals and convictions in the past few years (on many issues). It might not technically be “Denmark’s job”, but the fact is many of the folks in Guantanamo are in urgent need of help, and despite their innocence they were captured, held without cause or charge and tortured for years and years. How about a little help for those who need it? Daniel Lewis by Facebook

OPINION

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12 - 18 October 2012

Which way to the sausages?

Brick by Brick BY STEPHANIE BRICKMAN Stephanie Brickman has recently made the hop across the North Sea from Scotland to live in Denmark with her distinctly un-Danish family. This 40-something mother, wife and superstar is delighted to share her learning curve, rich as it is with laughs, blunders and expert witnesses.

EMEMBER when Danish was a kind of pastry? Well, for me, those days are now long gone and I’ve made the commitment to start language classes. At first I though I could avoid it – Danes all speak English, don’t they? Well yes, people speak English, but it won’t help you navigate the myriad of online processes necessary for normal life here. The home page displays a helpful little Union Flag, but after that you’re on your own. You’re also on your own when you encounter one of those phone messages. You know the kind of thing: “If you have no idea what I’m saying, press one. If you are feeling completely incompetent and just want to go home, press two. If you are starting to think you really should sign up for Danish classes, press three.” So, I signed up. Danish classes in Copenhagen exist under a kind of apartheid. If you speak English, at least one foreign language and have a degree, you do one kind of course. If you don’t, you do another. Expats go one way, immigrants go the other. My class is a daytime class, almost entirely female and a bastion of the welleducated following spouse. Our teacher

Danish classes exist under a kind of apartheid is called Mette and is probably the most patient Danish teacher in the world. “Jeg hedder ...” we all venture as Mette goes round the class. “Jeg kommer fra ...” “Dear God!” Mette says. Later I realise she was actually saying “Det er godt” (that’s good), which is a little more encouraging. “Is it safe to speak Danish with a cough sweet in my mouth?” whispers the girl next to me. I tell her I can do the Heimlich Manoeuvre. Our tongues, in spasms of weird vowel sounds, dribble gently onto our text books; we look like the cast of Lars von Trier’s ‘The Idiots’, liberating our inner-morons by pretending to be adults with learning difficulties. With Mette watching over us to check no-one actually chokes. Later we rehearse sentences like “Guang is a cleaner. In China, Guang

was an economist”. “What do you do? What did you do?” It’s not terribly reassuring on the career front. Ours is an emporium of temporarily wasted talent and we’ve all pinned our hopes on learning Danish. It’s what stands between us and resurrected careers, communication with in-laws, belonging here – the list is long. But could we still end up like Guang? Danes will tell you that Danish is the most difficult language in the world to learn. It’s not – remember you could be learning Thai. No-one wants to think their language is easy, so don’t tell your Danish friends, but the reality is that it is a perfectly do-able language. There are no verb endings in the present, not even a pesky third person ‘s’ like in English. There’s no future tense to learn, you just say it in the present and wave appropriately. Actually the waving might just be me. There are a couple of pages of irregular past tenses: most of them verbs so common, life will teach you them. Polish would present you with 20 or so possible forms of every noun. Chinese has unfathomable sing-song tones. Danish only gives you one real headache and that’s the pronuncia-

tion. In other languages you’ve learned, pronunciation has probably been the icing on the cake, as grammar is usually the bedrock of making yourself understood. In Danish, unless you get the pronunciation and intonation right, no-one will ever understand you except your teacher (Mette could understand a turnip speaking Danish). So all those listen-and-repeat homework exercises aren’t just a finishing touch, they are the key to being understood. There’s a tenuous relationship between the way things are written in Danish and the way they’re pronounced. Consonants are shunned in favour of mudslides of vowels. If you’re dyslexic, you will have to work twice as hard or wind up as linguistic road kill. But the day comes when you suddenly hear what people are saying, like pictures appearing in those colour blindness tests. “Jo!” you’ll say heartily. “Jeg taler dansk”. You’ll never use it outside Denmark. You may rarely use it socially inside Denmark, but at least you can ask for a carrier bag in Netto without being directed to the sausages.

of moral dictatorship. Recently, I participated in a workshop to devise some guidelines on how ‘ethnic minorities’ can use radio to voice their opinions. The attendees were from Denmark, Germany, Romania and France. As we sat there, deciding what should go in the guidelines, I could clearly see how easy it is for a group of people to sit and decide what kind of learning experience so-called ‘immigrants’ should have. There was a silent assumption in the group that perhaps ‘immigrants’ need to be taught the most basic rudimentary tasks. But wait a minute? Who said ‘immigrants’ had no idea about radio? Who said ‘immigrants’ are incapable of expressing themselves? The real reason is one no-one wanted to discuss. The reason why most immigrants are reduced to ridicule in most Western nations is not because they are incapable, but because of simple, ageold discrimination. On any given day, I can find nonnative Danes who live in Denmark and have amazing skills. In fact, many are qualified doctors, nurses, lawyers, intel-

lectuals and engineers. Yet in Denmark, their qualifications have been denied. Even those who master the difficult language and manage to get Danish qualifications suffer from the glass ceiling that all non-natives suffer. It is the same in most EU countries. The irony is that Westerners who migrated to Africa called themselves ‘settlers’ not ‘immigrants’. The word itself is not negative, but the meaning it has accumulated over the years in Europe and the West is. It is a negative connotation that is tantamount to stereotyping a group of people into one giant box with the sleek title of ‘immigrant’. In this regard, ‘immigrant’ has become a dirty word like the word ‘Judenschwein’ which was used by the Nazis to refer to Jews. The proud people did not call themselves this word at all. It was a word fostered upon them in order to demean them. The word ‘n****r’ is also such a dirty word. And the word ‘spic’ is another dirty word used to refer to the proud Latinos. Such words have no use in a progressive humanity. And now, ‘immigrant’ has become another such dirty word.

Immigrant has become a dirty word

Grain of Sand BY TENDAI TAGARIRA Tendai Tagarira is one of Africa’s most prolific independent authors, having penned over 16 books. Also a filmmaker and activist, he lives in exile in Denmark after receiving death threats from the Mugabe regime. He refuses to cut his hair until democracy reigns in Zimbabwe. Visit www.tendaitagarira.com for more.

N LIFE, history and society will try to define who you are. Those who have the power and means to suppress you will call you what they want, without your consent. But it’s not what they call you, but what you answer to. There are several terms that have acquired a negative meaning based on the manner in which these words were/are used, often to demean and belittle others. The words ‘n****r’, ‘spic’, and ‘Judenschwein’ are such words and they have no place in humanity. These are ugly and demeaning words and I am using them here only to prove an important point. Words like these have became free passes to justify the ill treatment of other people from different backgrounds. In Denmark, and most parts of the world, words like ‘n****r’ are still in official use. Why not refer to people with their real names instead of the names you give them in order to put them in a box of torment? I have a name, for example, and it is Tendai. Why look at me through the lens of segregation and call me ‘immigrant’? Yes, ‘immigrant’ has become a

dirty word too, used to box people into a giant glass ceiling. I have witnessed the word ‘immigrant’ take on a new meaning in the current Danish and European debate, which is fuelled by the far right and a general resentment of foreigners. Sometimes I ask myself whether humanity is capable of ever living in peace. For centuries we have failed to embrace one another, and history reveals a recurring ‘us against them’ perspective. In Denmark, I am ‘them’. Even my official documents issued by the government state that I am an ‘alien’. As if this wasn’t enough, I am still expected to integrate. Well, I consider myself integrated according to my own definition of the word. I was integrated the day I was born – integrated into a human family that is divided. Yet against all this, I remain integrated into humanity and I find it difficult to put people in boxes on the basis of their skin colour or origins. If anything has become a minority, it is the value of respect for others. Here in Europe, many talk about integration, but what they really mean is assimilation, which is a form

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10 NEWS

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Metro construction noise pollution creates havoc in the city centre, and there’s only one place people are being told where they can go

Poor air quality in Copenhagen Researchers suggest introducing ‘clean-air zones’ to Copenhagen to improve the steadily worsening air quality

new report has warned that unless the government acts soon, levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and small particulates in Copenhagen’s air will rise to dangerous levels and lead to increased levels of respiratory illness. “If there are no new initiatives, the EU’s threshold will be exceeded on at least seven roads by 2015,” researcher Solvang Jensen, the author of the report that was published by the Danish Centre for Environment and Energy (DCE) at Aarhus University, told Politiken newspaper. The report arrived shortly after the environment min-

ister Ida Auken (Socialistisk Folkeparti) had abandoned new initiatives to improve air quality in Danish cities. According to Politiken, the reason she gave is that “the latest figures show that we will not, after all, have excessive levels of NO2 in 2015 in Copenhagen.” Politiken challenged this view, arguing that the location where the government measures air quality in Copenhagen, on HC Andersen’s Boulevard between Tivoli and City Hall, is actually only the eighth-most polluted stretch of road in the city. Auken argued that the government dropped introducing stricter air quality legislation in order to wait for the publication of results from a congestion committee, which are due in three months’ time.

The congestion committee was established as a compromise after the government earlier this year abandoned introducing a congestion charge for the city. The commission’s job is to examine other methods of reducing city traffic. “We need cleaner air in the city, and we will make a proposal. But we will only do that once we have seen the congestion committee’s catalogue of proposals. It will be published in January, so instead of tackling the same thing twice, we will tackle it all at once. We have waited ten years so we can wait another three months.” The DCE recommends introducing ‘clean-air zones’ in the city where older petrol and diesel vehicles that do not conform to particular standards will be banned. (PS)

Unions furious at “broken promise” of 12 weeks of paternity leave for men

he government is cheating new fathers out of three months of earmarked paternity leave, according to the nation’s major trade unions. According to the weekly newsletter A4, the unions argue that the decision by the employment minister, Mette Frederiksen (Socialdemokraterne) – to defer earmarking three months of leave, and instead form a committee to examine the proposal – is a complete turn-around by the government. “The government promised in black and white that it would give three months in paternity leave,” Lizette Risgaard, a spokesperson for LO, the Danish confederation of trade unions, told A4. Risgaard said that when the parties that make up the current government were sitting in opposition to the previous Venstre-led regime, ensuring more time off for men, so they could to take part in nurturing their children, was a big part of their agenda. She said it was

When in opposition, the government parties advocated earmarking parental leave for fathers

“incomprehensible” that they would now back down on their promises. Representatives from the country’s trade unions all expressed frustration that extended paternity leave is not on the agenda for the current parliamentary session. Anette Borchorst, a social scientist specialising in gender equality at Aalborg University, said the government was break-

ing a promise. “This is an about-face,” she told A4. “The government stated clearly that it would earmark up to three months of paid paternity leave, and if they do not submit the bill, it is hard to interpret it as anything other than a broken promise.” Borchorst said that greater equality in child care leave will create a better balance in families. (RW)

Nyborg prisoner pulls off great burka escape Police are confident of capturing all three people involved and do not consider the escapee as being dangerous

Colourbox

he three-bedroom apartment can accommodate 12 adults and four children at a time. That’s all the Metro construction company, Metroselskabet, has offered as a place of refuge to no less than 90 families seeking escape from raging noise levels. As part of the Cityring expansion, a new Metro station is being laid near Copenhagen Central Station (Hovedbanegård), and residents in the area are being exposed to extreme levels of noise pollution, Politiken newspaper reported. Noise levels there have been recorded at 93 decibels around the Metro construction site. The permitted noise level is 70 decibels. Within apartments, residents are exposed to an astonishing 75 decibels of sound, from what is the biggest construction project in the capital in the past hundred years. Ture Andersen, an ear, nose and throat specialist at the hearing clinic Høreklinken in Odense, told Politiken that such noise exposure can create serious stress “symptoms [which] could include memory loss, disturbed sleep patterns and high blood pressure”.

Some 90-100 families are company spokesperson Rebekka thought to be affected by the Nymark attempted to shift the noise, and the only way to es- blame in an email sent to Policape the debacle is a single apart- tiken regarding the controversy. ment, situated nearby. “The Expropriation CommitVeronica Juhl, who is one tee requested Metroselskabet to of the many victims of the noise provide a large apartment within pollution, told the vicinity of the Politiken she area in question couldn’t believe it for residents who when she received seek refuge from Metroselskabet’s the noise,” Nyoffer in the post. We don’t know mark wrote. “It “At first whether to laugh is therefore up to glance I was imthe committee to pressed. I assumed or cry. It feels like decide whether that each affected measure is they’re mocking us that family would be appropriate or entitled to a three not.” bedroom apartment, but they’re Metroselskabet has also reliterally offering one apartment vealed that the apartment was to accommodate a whole street,” used by a total of eleven people she said. “We don’t know wheth- during the latter part of Seper to laugh or cry. It feels like tember, and has since been unthey’re mocking us.” occupied. Christian Mogensen, who is In a bid to calm the situathe former head of the the body tion, the city’s deputy mayor for responsible for relocating fami- employment and integration, lies affected by Metro construc- Anna Mee Allerslev (Radikale), tion (Expropriation Commit- told Politiken that when undertee), told Politiken that the offer going such a massive project, was woefully inadequate. some inconvenience will have to “To only offer a single three- be tolerated. bedroom flat to 90 families as “We need to be aware that in a means to escape the noise is order for the Metroselskabet to completely unreasonable,” Mo- progress with its work, certain gensen said. “Families should waivers must be accepted in reat least be offered hotel rooms gards to noise pollution levels,” where they can reside until the she said. “Then we can look noise levels subside. People are into how to reduce construction sick of living around here.” noise in the future.” While Metroselskabet has The expansion of the Metro is yet to make a public statement, expected to finish in 2018. (BSM)

Government backs off paternity leave promise Colourbox

Families affected by Metro noise asked to share one apartment

sing a burka supplied by a visitor, a prisoner managed to escape from Nyborg State Prison in Funen on Saturday evening. The inmate was visited by a man and a woman clad in a burka, a traditional Muslim garment that veils the face. At some point during the visit, the inmate put on the burka and calmly strolled out of the prison with the other man at around 18:30. Funen police force have notified the Schengen area of the 30-year-old’s escape and have searched his known hang-outs. Prison inspector Arne Tornvig Christensen said that the prison is investigating how the breakout could have happened. “We strengthened our inspection and supervision procedures for visits a year or so ago. But we now have to see whether or not protocol should be further beefed up,” Christensen told Ekstra Bladet tabloid. “He is not a hardened criminal, and he has no

Police have released a photo of the suspect they are searching for

relations to gang activity.” The woman who arrived wearing the burka also mysteriously escaped, although the police expect to charge her with aiding and abetting. “I can confirm that we are looking for all three. We clearly believe that they were all involved in the escape and are in cahoots,” Funen Police spokesperson Lars Thede told Ekstra Bladet. “He is a foreigner and we believe that he will try to reach his home country, but we don’t see him as being

dangerous and won’t use the media in our hunt. But we’ll get him and the other two as well.” The national prison association, Fængselsforbundet, indicated that procedure dictates that visitors are to be checked when they arrive and depart, and therefore believed that the escape was the result of human error. If caught, the escaped inmate could face two additional years on top of his current sentence, while his helper also faces jail time. (CW)

Online this week The end of mass Malmö migration? Since the opening of the Øresund Bridge in 2000, Danish families have been migrating across the strait to Malmö in favour of considerably cheaper real estate and automobiles and, for international couples, less rigid immigration laws. With comparatively high salaries from their jobs in Copenhagen and

a strong exchange rate, many chose to commute between the two cities. Lately, however, the trend has been declining. According to a study by Nykredit, 180 Danes moved back to Copenhagen from Malmö in 2012, and the total number of Danes in the southern Swedish city has decreased by 720 since 2010.

Opposition: Cheaper to fund eastern European prisons Opposition parties Venstre (V), Konservative (K) and Dansk Folkeparti (DF) are willing to help fund new prison wings or rehabilitation programmes in eastern European countries in order to keep foreign criminals out of Denmark. Prison space in Denmark costs 1,900 kroner a day, and the parties suggest that

this cost could be spared if some of that money were to be directly wired to the countries in question. “Denmark spends almost a quarter of a million kroner on incarcerating criminals who could just as well be convicted and held in their own countries,” Karsten Lauritzen, a spokesperson for V, said.

Big Arnie totally recalls Nielsen fling ahead of city trip Arnold Schwarzenegger was in Copenhagen on Thursday to present the Sustainia Award, but it wasn’t the first time he’s been inside Denmark. Schwarzenegger’s soon-to-be released autobiography reveals that in 1985 he had an affair with Danish actress Brigitte

Nielsen. Now that his governatorship and marriage are terminated, Schwarzenegger is putting his philandering aside and focusing on bigger and better things – including climate change, which brought him to Copenhagen to present the Sustania award.

Read the full stories at cphpost.dk

COMMUNITY

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12 - 18 October 2012

Irish Rover salutes the Black Stuff: a reason to party since 1755 PHOTOS: CLIVE THAIN

WORDS: BEN HAMILTON

The early-crowd performers were the Deano Paddy Band

Arthur Guinness Day, is the closest this city gets to celebrating the official start of autumn – just as St Patrick’s Day almost coincides with the advent of spring. AGD on September 27 provided the revellers of the Irish Rover pub on Strøget, and ravishing Rikke (pictured), the perfect excuse to welcome in the new season with Arthur’s brew, Irish stew, and live music from a motley crew or two

The best looking male award once again went to Handsome Mick Farrelly (pictured centre, with the Rover’s Kieran and Will Kelly)

Eugene Hanrahan popped in (not out) because Tivoli definitely wasn’t open

The Rovers Band (Barry Richard and Brian Armstrong) whipped the dancefloor up into a frenzy

Bejesus, this man knows how to work a room – here he is with George from Cork …

The Rover’s Kieran had some catching up to do with Welsh lass Haz Roth

Vyte Bardauskaite from Lithuania …

Jimmy Haywood, with the piercing stare, is the pub’s answer to Lee Van Cleef

And they carried on strutting their stuff until the early hours – in true Gaelic fashion

and his younger brother, the landlord himself: Jono Farrelly

Befitting a celebration of the Black Stuff, there were just as many dark hats as green

And as if on cue, the redhead appeared to cap a perfect Irish celebration

COMMUNITY

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12- 18 October 2012

ABOUT TOWN PHOTOS BY HASSE FERROLD UNLESS OTHERWISE STATED

The NGG International Department recently held a successful sports day, along with Nordsjællands Grundskole and Gymnasium, which was attended by 1,500 students and 140 teachers. In total, 43 other nationalities were represented – that’s more than the 1896 Olympics! The races included some classics – an egg-and-spoon race and sack race – and the day ended with a waterballoon fight (see right). Let’s just say it was 1,500 vs 140. Photos: NGG ID

Swedish ambassador Inga Eriksson Fogh was in attendance at an inspiration meeting and workshop organised by Tourism in Scandia last week on Thursday

German ambassador Michael Zenner (fifth from left) last week on Thursday hosted a celebration of Tag Der Deutschen Einheit (the Day of German Unity, which marks the fall of the Berlin Wall) at his residence. The event included a performance by a choir from Skt Petri Schule and musicians from Den Kgl Livgarde (the royal lifeguards)

French ambassador Veronique Bujon-Barre (left) was among the attendees at the Global Green Growth Forum. Here she is appropriately pictured with an electric Renault and Delphine Batho, the French minister for ecology, sustainable development and energy, who also attended the forum

COMING UP SOON Harry Burton discusses Harold Pinter

Krudttønden, Serridslevvej 2, Cph Ø; Wed Nov 7, 18:15-20:00; register at www.bccd.dk, event@bccd.dk, or 3118 7558

Harry Burton, an actor and director who was a close acquaintance of the late, esteemed playwright Harold Pinter, will be visiting Krudttønden theatre for a special event (with a buffer dinner no less) to talk about his friend and colleague and answer any questions afterwards. The event is being put on by the British Chamber of Commerce in co-operation with That Theatre Company & Why Not Theatre Company, whose joint production of Pinter’s Old Times will follow the talk and is included in the price of the evening (enquire with the BCCD for details). And a day later, Burton will once again appear, this time to show a film about Pinter in the foyer and afterwards answer questions (with drink and snacks, admission costs 100kr). Harry Potter Festival

Odense Banegård Centre, Østre Stationsvej 15, Odense; starts Thu Oct 18, 15:00, ends Sat Oct 20 16:00; www.odensebib.dk

It’s a fair old train ride away, but your kids will love you ... until Christmas at least. So instead of platform 9 ¾, go to platform six and hop on the express to Odense to join in the fun at Odense Banegård Centre. Odense Hovedbiblioteket’s event has been going on for several years now, and two years ago was even blessed by an appearance by the great woman herself, JK Rowling.

Wine Tasting Extravaganza

Restaurant TIGHT, Hyskenstræde 10, Cph K; Fri Oct 19, 19:00; price: 350kr

The international owners of Tight Restaurant and wine company K&S introduce you to a tasting evening. Enjoy tapas, washed down by a wide selection of red and white wine. CTC Open Stage

Cafe Cadeau, HC Ørsteds Vej 28, Frederiksberg; Fri Oct 19, 19:00; www.meetup.com/CopenhagenTheatre-Circle

Curtains up! The stage is open for all kinds of performers from all over the world! This is the chance to show yourself and your artistic inspiration in front of an audience, which is waiting to be fascinated. Don’t forget to sign up! Renaissance lecture

University of Copenhagen, Faculty of Humanities, 22.0.11, Njalsgade 76, Cph S; Fri Oct 12, 15:00-16:45; www.hum.ku.dk

A lecture on the Renaissance, most particularly the Italian Rinascimento, at the university. Biljard and party evening

Tilt - Wettergrens Serverings HB, Drottninggatan 36, Malmö; Fri Oct 12, 19:00; table: 40SEK; www. meetup.com/malmo-internationals

Do you like Martin Scorsese’s ‘The Colour of Money’? Then this event is for you. It promises billiards, but it will descend into pool when everyone realises the rules are impossible to understand. And it doesn’t matter if you’re no Fast Eddie, as it’s principally an event to meet new people and have a good time.

Tuesday was a big day for Uganda, which celebrated the 50th anniversary of its independence day with a celebration at the Royal Hotel. Pictured here is the Ugandan ambassador Joseph Tomusange (right) with keynote speaker Aston Kajaira (centre), Uganda’s minister of finance and planning

Matisse’s Artistic Personality

Statens Museum for Kunst, Cph K; Sat 13 Oct, 14:00-15:00; free adm

An English-language lecture by French art historian Caroline Levisse in connection with the exhibition ‘Henri Matisse – Doubles and Variations’, which is being organised in co-operation with the French Institute. Zumba Charity & Mindful Moves Event

Gentofte Kommune, Bernstorffsvej 161, Gentofte; Sat Oct 27, 14:00-16:00; prices: one lesson 100kr, two lessons 140kr; register at post@connieyndal.dk; www. pinktribute.dk

Founded in 2003 by two Americans, the non-profit association Pink Tribute helps to raise funds to fight breast cancer. And later this month, in partnership with Zumba Organisation instructors, it is organising a charity event to support its cause. Reflections on the Danish presidency of the EU

Conference Suite, Radisson Blu Royal Hotel, Hammerichsgade 1, Cph K; Fri Oct 26, 11:45-13:00; register at www.bccd.dk/Events

Reviewing the six months of the Danish presidency of the EU, the BCCD is pleased to invite you to this talk that will discuss the highlights of the period. It will include an appearance by the Danish ambassador to the UK, Anne Steffensen.

MARIA ANTONIETTA RICCI

LIVING IN AN EXPAT WORLD Belgium’s Tiny Maerschalk, who has worked for the International Community networking platform since its foundation in 2008, knows how it feels to settle in a new country. Dedicated to improving conditions for new arrivals, here she shares her insights about the issues that mean most to internationals in Denmark

HAVE TO admit that I am a bit of a nerd when it comes to numbers and surveys concerning international employees in Denmark. I always find it interesting to dive into the results and try to pinpoint the reasons behind the numbers. Why are companies having difficulties attracting international talents? Which issues support their ability to attract highly-skilled foreign employees? These surveys always provide food for thought, and AmCham Denmark’s recent ‘Business Barometer 2012’ is no exception. The survey shows that Denmark’s ability to attract and retain talented foreign employees is only rated as ‘above average’ or better by 11 percent of the respondents, whereas 47 percent find it to be ‘below average’ or ‘poor’. Poor numbers, to say the least. To me, and probably everyone else in this field, it is no surprise that taxation, bureaucracy and openness towards foreigners are very important issues regarding the attraction and retention of international employees – and major concerns for companies in Denmark that aim to improve

competitiveness by attracting international talents. Before moving to Denmark, I didn’t really contemplate these issues, as I was only planning to stay here for nine months. However, I was fortunate enough to be recruited to a job during my stay. Then bureaucracy and taxation caught my attention. That was many years ago, but it seems that these issues are still on top of everybody’s list.

Why are companies having difficulties attracting international talents? Some 83.5 percent of the companies in the survey are located in the Greater Copenhagen area, which may lead one to think that the issues only concern this area. However, International Community’s own surveys, as well as surveys from other areas, show similar results. Many projects and organisations all over the country work

hard and spend a lot of money to improve the conditions for international employees and their families. However, the same challenges will continue to show up again and again, unless we find a solution to the challenges at a higher level. I have argued for a national strategy for quite some time now – and this new research supports my point. In order to become a prosperous society of knowledge and innovation where international talents flourish, we need to implement a national strategy that focuses on solutions to the challenges that continuously appear in these surveys. The strategy must promote competitiveness and support economic growth, and also the attraction and retention of both Danish and international talent. Furthermore, the strategy should address the fields of education, immigration, tax and public service, and it should focus on measures to bring a more internationally orientated focus to Danish society. All relevant stakeholders at national, regional and local levels should collaborate on this strategy – I, for one, would love to participate.

community

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Dave Smith Party in a style befitting of the Emerald Isle: reel like there’s no tomorrow and saturate your sweat with a pint at the bar

Chris Eichbaum

No luck of the Irish needed – good times always guaranteed!

f you happen to come by Rysensteensgade 3 during the fourth weekend of October, you might be lucky enough to be met by the exciting sound of an Irish reel and frequent yells streaming out of the open windows. But it is not a concert – it is instead a frenetic session of Irish set dancing you have stumbled upon. That date is one of the annual highlights for the CIS (Copenhagen Irish Set Dancers) because an Irish instructor (this time, Ultan Mulcahy) is invited over from the old country to teach the Danish dancers new sets and steps. There’s a workshop during the day, and a ceìlì – the Irish word for a ball – in the evening with live music. But that’s not the only thing going on with the CIS. Every Monday night throughout the year – except during summer – a group of dancers, both beginners and the more experienced, meet in Frederiksberg for dancing in a most joyful atmosphere. Here local instructors, although still very able, teach the dancers new sets and lead them through old ones to lively Irish jigs, reels and polkas played on CDs – of which there is a great selection. The dancers work hard and it can get extremely hot! As they say in Ireland: “It’s cheaper to dance than to heat the house.” There is a very friendly atmosphere, and after the dance there

The banter will be flying when old acquaintances catch up: “You looked good on the dancefloor ... in 1984!”

its 20th anniversary! It will be marked by one hell of a night: an explosion of an international event with workshops and ceìlìs. However, it is still a while away and is currently in its planning stage. Take a moment to imagine the scene at such an event as old and regular faces catch up, sometimes after absences spanning decades. And then, once the joyous reunions have dissipated, a cheerful and friendly

is always a smaller group who meet at the local pub for a beer. There are set dancing groups not only in Copenhagen, but also in south, mid and west Jutland, with whom there are fruitful co-operations, whether it’s visiting each other or sharing the expenses of visiting Irish instructors. There’s no better time to join CIS, because at the end of the present dance season, in June 2013, it will be celebrating

atmosphere will settle in, punctuated by banter, as errors inevitably creep in, rippling across the floor. Later, it will be lovely to see everybody dressed up for the ceìlì. And once the music gets going, it will take those gathered to a different dimension, and it will only be afterwards that you can truly say you were there. “It is wonderful the way dance and music can unite,” en-

thuses John Christiansen, one of the CIS board members of the group, who is still reeling strong after years of dedication. “A state of pure being with no thinking. You are in a state of sublimity, unbreakable. The band creates that state; no-one can explain how it happens; the band affects the dancers and the dancers the band – it’s a magical synergy. The dancers are suddenly the creators of the music and the musicians the creators

of the dance.” Newcomers are welcome to attend one of the regular Copenhagen Irish Set Dancers meetings at Skolen on Nyelandsvej, every Monday from 18:00 for old-style step dancing, or from 19:30 for set dancing. An annual membership is 1,000 kroner. However, newcomers are welcome to try it out three times free of charge before joining. Learn more at www. setdance.dk

Mark Hojelsen Some 70 percent of the team were making their debuts, but that didn’t stop the international team from impressing

he Exiles Ladies side will this Saturday take extra motivation into the next round of the Dansk Rugby Union (DRU) DM 2012 Ladies Series, after an impressive display from some of their debutants at the Frederiksberg rugby grounds on September 22, where they won one and lost one of their two games. It bodes well for 2013 at the end of what has been a transitional season for Exiles. It was initially a nervous squad who assembled, as it only included three stalwarts of the regular team and no less than seven making their debuts, including three playing their first ever game of rugby. But there were no signs of the pre-game jitters once the

game got under way, and Exiles – who are out of contention to win this year’s championship – started with a bang when debutant Kirstine Liedecke scorched down the wing to score the first try of the game, or so the crowd thought. Unfortunately, Liedecke’s inexperience showed, as the try was disallowed by a referee not satisfied with the grounding of the ball. And then to confound matters, CBS Rugby, after soaking up some severe Exiles pressure, scored a try of their own to lead 5-0 at half-time. But the Exiles were clearly not in the mood to lose, and debutant Julie Sjøqvist quickly levelled matters, sidestepping through the CBS defensive line to sprint home a try in her first ever game of rugby. And then another rookie, Christina Jorgensen, took an excellent lineout steal, which led to Becky Jensen scoring from a quick tap penalty and dummy. Linda McLean added a third before CBS replied with a converted try just before the final whistle.

Doane Gregory

Hopes raised for 2013 as Exile rookies prove to be tough cookies

There was seemingly no way of stopping Kirstine Liedecke when she scorched down the wing in the opening moments of the game

Final score: Exiles Ladies 15, CBS 12. However, in the second game of the day, the ladies faced tougher opposition in the form of Grenå, the third-ranked team in the series. And while Exiles raced into a lead thanks

to quick tries from debutants Laura Shrum and Sjøqvist again, Grenå responded with two of their own to lead at the break 12-10. The second-half was a stalemate in which two fatigued teams cancelled each other out. And while Exiles debutant Kir-

sa Nørregaard impressed with her stamina, it was Grenå who eventually prevailed, scoring a converted try at fulltime to seal a 19-10 win. “I love this game and cannot wait to play again in the next round,” said two-try heroine

Sjøqvist after the game. Which is great news for Exiles fans and an ominous warning to the rest of the teams in the DM 2012 Ladies Series ahead of the 2013 season. The Exiles’ next games are on Saturday at Grenå Rugby Klub.

SPORT

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12- 18 October 2012

The curse of Viasat! Laudrup can’t win with Denmark tuned in CHRISTIAN WENANDE It’s the Ugly Duckling in reverse! They began the season as Swans who could do no wrong – now they can’t even beat Reading at home

T HAD STARTED so well. QPR thumped 5-0 at Loftus Road. The following week West Ham hammered 3-0 at home. Swansea City were playing attractive, free-flowing possession football, scoring goals galore and the team were brimming with confidence. The gaffer had a touch of class, a softspoken gentlemanly eloquence and could still do things with a ball that inspired awe from his players. Michael Laudrup had

arrived. It was golden. Bona fide. The Ugly Ducklings, who just ten years earlier had escaped relegation down to non-league football on the final day of the season, were now every inch the Swans, leading the English top flight for the first time since 1981. They were walking in the clouds. And then Viasat came along. It all started in late August when Danish broadcaster Viasat triumphantly (and a little bit jingoistically) announced that it would be showing all the Swansea matches, much to the consternation of many of its international patrons. Since then, the Welsh side have been unable to pick up a win in the league, following a 2-2 draw with Sunderland by losing three on the

Factfile | Sporting curses •

Curse of the Bambino: The Boston Red Sox went 86 years without winning a World Series in baseball after they sold Babe Ruth to their rivals, the New York Yankees, during which time the Yankees won 26 titles. The curse of the Bambino, Ruth’s nickname, fell in 2004 when the Red Sox finally won.

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Birmingham City Curse: Birmingham City were said to be cursed from 1906-2006, after the club moved into a new stadium on land used by gypsies, who cursed them after they were forced to move. Attaching crucifixes to floodlights and painting the team’s boots red were all employed to revoke the curse, and one manager (Barry Fry) even urinated in all four corners of the pitch on the advice of a clairvoyant.

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The Madden Curse: Since 1999, nearly every player who has appeared on the cover of the NFL Madden computer game series has experienced a dip in performance, usually due to an injury in the season following.

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Norwegian Sami curse: In 1999, after a local derby, Hammerfest football team criticised the referee who in turn demanded an apology or he would ‘gande’ (a Sami curse) the team so that they would lose the rest of their games and be relegated. The coach did not apologise and Hammerfest ended up getting relegated.

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The Masters Par 3 curse: The Masters Tournament, held annually at the Augusta National Golf Club in USA, begins with an informal par 3 competition. No winner of this has ever gone on to win the main tournament in the same year.

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Australian witch doctor curse: In 1970, on a trip to play Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Australia consulted a witch doctor, who buried bones near the goal-posts before the match, cursing the opposition. Australia won 3-1, but when the players couldn’t come up with the 1,000 pounds to pay the witch doctor, he turned the curse back on Australia, who then lost to Israel and failed to qualify for the 1970 World Cup in Mexico.

trot without scoring to Aston Villa, Everton and Stoke, before salvaging a 2-2 draw at home to minnows Reading. Seven games in, and Swansea still haven’t played any of the big clubs. It could get ugly. The curse of Viasat was further compounded a couple of weeks ago when Laudrup seemed to openly endorse the payment of other teams as an incentive to win, something that is clearly against league rules in England. Laudrup’s favourable view of the Spanish ‘suitcase’ culture, in which teams offer other teams money if they win, ruffled more than a few feathers in the more rigid and puritanical English football echelons. After a legendary playing career that included memorable moments with clubs like Barcelona, Real Madrid, Juventus, Lazio and Ajax, there were few people who envisioned him turning up at Liberty Stadium in Wales to lead the Swans. But then again, it was somehow a fitting move for the Great Dane who always did the unpredictable on the pitch. Laudrup wasted no time in bringing in some new faces to help continue Swansea’s TikiTaka attacking brand of football, signing Jose Manuel ‘Chico’ Flores from Genoa, Pablo Hernandez from Valencia, Jonathan De Guzman from Villarreal, KiSung yeung from Celtic, Michu from Rayo Vallecano and Kyle Bartley from Arsenal, to mention a few. The two million pound acquisition of Michu looks to be an early candidate for the Premier League signing of the season – he has already contributed five goals and an assist. But more importantly, Laudrup looks to have managed to favourably replace the losses of Joe Allen to Liverpool and Scott Sinclair to Manchester City, while adding some continental flair who cater to his style of possession football. On top of the new signings, Laudrup’s presence at the club has helped Swansea extend the contracts of several important players such as Dutch international goalkeeper Michael Vorm and Welsh international defender Neil Taylor, who unfortunately suffered a broken ankle in early September. And Laudrup’s exploits on

Laudrup’s early-season cheery disposition has slowly been replaced by a grimace

and off the pitch have led to many Swansea fans quickly embracing their new coach, even though he is charged with the daunting task of filling the managerial shoes of former manager Brendan Rodgers, who guided the Swans to an impressive 11th place last year before taking over the embattled reins at Liverpool. “I can’t speak for all Swans fans, but most of us are very happy with the way Michael Laudrup has begun his reign as Swans boss,” Chris Carra, who runs the Swansea fan blog site Forza Swansea, told The Copenhagen Post. “His style is different from Brendan Rodgers − more attacking and fast-paced – and we are seeing more goals at both ends because of it. The first few games were amazing, though three losses in a row mean there is still work to do to the team. We’ve had some brilliant new signings because of Laudrup and I feel he can take the club further than Brendan Rodgers − eventually.” But while September may have been a difficult period for Laudrup and Swansea, the near future may not provide much relief with Manchester City and Chelsea lurking on the immediate horizon. And particularly

momentous will be their fourth round League Cup fixture against Liverpool on October 29 in a match that will see Rodgers and Allen return to their former home. While Laudrup’s tenure in Wales is still in its infancy, he knows that failure at Swansea may signal the end of his once so promising managerial career. Because after starting as the assistant coach for Denmark in 2000, and then leading Brøndby to a league double in 2005, his managerial move to the big leagues has left a rather unremarkable impression. It had started so promisingly. His first year at Spanish club Getafe (2006-07) included a Copa del Rey final loss to Valencia and an appearance in the UEFA Cup quarter-finals in which they lost in extra time to Bayern Munich. Laudrup looked primed to take the next step. But his move to Spartak Moscow, his first seriously big club, ended in despair after just seven short months when he was sacked following a 0-3 loss to rivals Dynamo Moscow in the Russian Cup. The broadcasting culprit that time was TV2 Sport after it announced

that it would show all the Spartak games, yet again heralding Laudrup’s demise only months later. He maintained afterwards that he would never again choose to coach a team from a country whose language he did not speak. Just over a year later, in 2009, he was back in Spain with Real Mallorca and things looked to be back on track once again. But Mallorca was ejected from European football due to financial problems and was forced to sell many of its top players. Laudrup managed to save the club from relegation, but a poor relationship with the director of football, Lorenzo Serra Ferrer, led to his resignation in September 2011. Joining Swansea in June, Laudrup has taken some promising first steps in England, but failing at Swansea the way he did in Russia could potentially signal Laudrup’s swan-song in international football management. Then again, he is seen by many as Morten Olsen’s natural successor for the Danish national team and he could always start over again at Brøndby. Lord knows, they could use his help, and at least he wouldn’t have to worry about always being on television.

SPORTS NEWS AND BRIEFS Kasper’s a keeper

Birdie blitz in vain

Agger finally does

TV2 offloads channel

Faxe or axe?

Woz woes continue

EXPECTANT FATHER Kasper Schmeichel has opted not to take his place in the Danish squad for the 2014 World Cup qualifiers against Bulgaria on Friday and Italy next Wednesday. FCN’s Jesper Hansen will take the Leicester City keeper’s place. Meanwhile, Bulgaria have called up Verona striker Valeri Bojinov, but there is no place for Bolton’s Martin Petrov or Dimitar Berbatov, who has retired.

A BURST of birdies by Thorbjørn Olesen on the back nine at St Andrews on the fourth day of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship took the young Dane to the top of the leaderboard, but in the end he had to settle for second place, despite carding a 68. South Africa’s Branden Grace, who Olesen had trailed by four strokes at the start of play, dug deep to hold his nerve to win by two strokes.

LIVERPOOL DEFENDER Daniel Agger, 27, has finally signed a new contract, although no details were released by the English Premier League club. Agger, who joined Liverpool in 2006, had been linked with a move to EPL champions Manchester City. “I never wanted to go anywhere else,” Agger told media, adding that he liked the style introduced by new manager Brendan Rogers.

TV2 HAS agreed to sell its 51 percent stake in TV2 Sport to Modern Times Group, the Swedishbased owner of Viasat, which will now become the sole owner. As part of the deal, TV2 has acquired the broadcast rights to the men’s and women’s 2016 and 2018 European Handball Championship. A TV2 spokesman said the joint ownership had caused problems: both with making decisions and the competition authorities.

THE SPORTS media were over the weekend awash with stories about the imminent departure of Brøndby coach Auri Skarbalius, but now it looks more likely he will stay and be joined by John ‘Faxe’ Jensen. However, pundits have questioned whether the partnership will work. “It must be made clear to the players who has the ultimate responsibility,” Jesper Thygesen told Sporten.dk.

CAROLINE WOZNIACKI has failed to kick on from her win in the insignificant KDB Korea Open in September, losing in the early rounds of two premier tournaments – Tokyo’s Toray Pan Pacific Open and the China Open – in the quarter-finals and third round respectively. Wozniacki has so far failed to make a premier final in 2012, compared to seven in 2011, five of which she won.

Business

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12 - 18 October 2012

Copenhagen betting its future on clean technology Colourbox

Peter Stanners The city hopes that the technology that will enable it to become carbon-neutral will also turn around economic woes

openhagen’s ‘green’ credentials were once again reinforced this week following the release of an OECD report that praised the results of the city’s investments in renewable energy and low-carbon technology. The report pointed out that companies in Copenhagen increased their exports of green services and products by 55 percent between 2004 and 2009, with only four percent of companies experiencing a decrease in exports between 2010 and 2011. The organisation stated that the success was the result of an ambitious climate policy and strong co-operation between the public and private sectors. The OECD’s verdict vindicates the city’s gamble on investing in green technology – also called ‘cleantech’ – to both tackle environmental issues and boost the city’s flagging economy. The strategy includes branding Copenhagen as a global centre for the development of green technology. As part of this, Copenhagen this week held the second annual Global Green

Copenhagen hopes to become a global hub for the development of green technology, such as wind turbines

Growth Forum (3GF). The purpose of the conference is to bring together the media, industry, and global government representatives in order to speed up the transition to economies based on renewable energy rather than fossil fuels like oil and coal. Copenhagen’s mayor, Frank Jensen (Socialdemokraterne), hopes, however, that the city will become more than the symbolic site of the move towards green technology. “We hope that our plan to make Copenhagen the world’s first CO2-neutral capital city will help stimulate growth by making it a global hub for innovation in green technology,” Jensen told The Copenhagen

Post in a recent interview. Jensen was referring to the ambitious climate plan put forward by the city this year that will see it move away from fossil fuel technology and become fully carbon-neutral by 2025. In order to meet its target, the city needs new technology – technology that might not otherwise be developed unless the city makes a guarantee to invest heavily in transitioning away from carbon energy sources over the coming decades. According to Jensen, the city’s climate plan identifies nine specific areas to meet carbon reduction targets – such as energy efficiency – that allow business to know which technologies the city will then be placing orders for.

Nationalbanken buys up 600 million kroner

ata released Tuesday indicates that Denmark’s national bank, Nationalbanken, purchased 600 million kroner (approximately $103.9 million or 80.5 million euros) using foreign currency reserves. The purchase, which effectively removes kroner from circulation, serves to strengthen the krone against the euro. Such currency adjustments are intended to steady exchange rates and facilitate international business. The purchase of kroner definitively ends an 18-month period during which the bank sold kroner off-and-on in order to stunt the currency’s rise against the euro. The krone’s value against the euro has depreciated slightly

since June, which has been worrisome for investors. If the krone continues its depreciation, it will probably mean a hike in the central bank’s interest rates – another way to prevent inflation and keep the kroner steady, but one that deters investments and can lead to economic deceleration. Experts, however, agree that a hike in the interest rate, while perhaps inevitable, won’t happen soon. “[Nationalbank’s] intervention was very modest and we will need to see markedly higher purchases before the pressure on the krone is large enough to justify a rate hike,” Citi Group economist Tina Mortensen told the Wall Street Journal. Jan Storup Nielsen, an analyst at Nordea – one of Denmark’s most common banks and Scandinavia’s largest financial group – shared Mortensen’s view. “The small amount of kro-

Colourbox

Purchase part of programme meant to keep kroner strong in euro-dominated market

“Competition, especially in the cleantech field, will soon become so fierce that increasing our efforts and focus is vital if we hope to succeed and stay in front,” she said. Copenhagen has its share of environmental problems, however, which are particularly related to transport sector. This week, it was revealed that the city’s air quality will only continue to worsen unless new initiatives to limit traffic pollution are implemented. The transport sector is also resolutely carbon heavy despite the ambitions of electric car manufacturers, such as Better Place, that hope to electrify vehicles using renewable energy. A more short-term solution is to transition more citydwellers onto public transport, which the now-defunct congestion charge would have created an incentive for. Jensen is still optimistic about reducing traffic in the city, however, through the introduction of a nationwide road pricing system and improved public transport network. “We are investing in public transport and expanding the Metro to the regional bus and traffic networks as well as making big infrastructure investments, such as the harbour tunnel, to lead traffic around the city,” Jensen said.

Ministry looks to end golden handshakes

fficials at the Ministry of Business and Growth are examining why banks give departing CEOs million-kroner ‘golden handshakes’ despite poor performances. Last week it was reported that the former CEO of Vestjysk Bank, Frank Kristensen, received more than 10 million kroner for retiring after the bank’s board of directors lost faith in his leadership. Increased scrutiny over the partially state-supported banks has broad political support. “None of us could look our constituents in the eye if we did not examine these payments,” said Socialdemokraterne’s business spokesperson Benny Engelbrecht. Executive lawyer Arvid Andersen said that the state may not be able to get around paying the severance payments. “The state can, of course, consider withdrawing its support, but it would be more of a political decision than a legal one,” said Andersen. Ole Birk Olesen from Liberal Alliance said it seemed strange that Kristensen was given such a large severance pay. A ministry spokesperson declined to comment, saying only that an investigation was ongoing. (J-P)

BRITISH CHAMBER OF COMMERCE IN DENMARK

UK Market Access Seminar

Snatching up kroner serves to strengthen it against the euro

ner they have bought so far means that the rate hike is still some time ahead,” he told the Wall Street Journal. Denmark’s decision not to join the Eurozone has long been debated around the country, but the latest opinion poll shows more Danes oppose adopting the euro than ever before (see page 2). (HB)

The UK is a large and close market which is attractive to many Danish businesses. Although Denmark and the UK are close trading partners, there are still differences in the way business is being conducted in the two countries and it is important that these are understood and overcome. Would you like to hear more about some of the challenges Danish companies have faced, and overcome, when entering the UK market? Are you interested in some practical advice about how to conduct business in the UK? Two events will be held jointly with the Danish UK Chamber in Aarhus and Copenhagen. Join us, and get insight into the current British business climate and how you could succeed in this market. The major considerations regarding export and capital when setting up in the UK will be outlined and some possible solutions offered. The forum will focus on sharing the experiences and knowledge gained by people and companies who have tried it. Plus, it will also be an excellent networking opportunity! This event is free of charge for everyone. Please specify which day you would like to attend. Please note the deadline for registration is 4 November 2012.

Exchange Rates Australian Dollars AUD

Canada Dollars CAD

Euro EUR

Japan Yen JPY

Russia Rubles RUB

Sweden Kronor SEK

Switzerland Francs CHF

UK Pounds GBP

United States Dollars USD

Sell

5.65

5.73

7.36

0.07

0.18

0.84

6.05

9.07

5.65

Buy

6.17

6.19

7.59

0.07

0.20

0.88

6.25

9.54

5.92

Price in kroner for one unit of foreign currency

Jensen is betting that other capital cities around the world will follow Copenhagen’s lead to become carbon-neutral. And with Copenhagen so far ahead of other cities, it will then act as a showcase for clean technology. “Copenhagen will become a laboratory for testing these technologies, and businesses will have a site to invite city officials from around the world to visit and see what does and doesn’t work,” Jensen told The Copenhagen Post. To ensure that there are the necessary businesses to develop the technology it needs – and the economic growth they are expected to generate – the city has developed the Copenhagen Cleantech Cluster (CCC) to bring together business, research and government authorities in order to increase innovation and development. According to a press release from Copenhagen Capacity – the city’s official agency for soliciting investment, which is a CCC partner – the OECD identified the CCC as having successfully contributed to developing economic growth in Copenhagen. The head of CCC, Marianna Lubanski, welcomed the news but added that Copenhagen needed to maintain the investment in order to retain its global position.

Date: 10 October 2012

Venues 14 November 2012 Delacour Dania Lille Torv 6 8000 Aarhus C Denmark 15 November 2012 Delacour Dania Langebrogade 4 1411 Copenhagen K Denmark Speakers Laura Thorborg, The Royal Danish Embassy, London Hans Monberg, UKTI, Copenhagen Bent Bang Haulrik, KapitalBørsen Martin Williams, European Business Solutions Preben Paulsen, Planova

Non-members are very welcome. Please contact BCCD or go to www.bccd.dk for further information

If you would like to attend then please send us an email (event@bccd.dk) or call +45 31 18 75 58 • official media partner Denmark’s only English-language newspaper

THE COPENHAGEN POST THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK SPOUSE EMPLOYMENT PAGE

SPOUSE: Monika Sysiak FROM: Poland SEEKING WORK IN: Greater Copenhagen / eastern Zealand QUALIFICATION: Master degree in Environmental Engineering from Cracow University of Technology. Major in Water Supply, Sewage and Waste Treatment and Water Quality Protection. Completed one semester in Environmental Engineering at Engineering College of Aarhus. EXPERIENCE: Internship during studies in designing water supply systems and sewerage systems. LOOKING FOR: Graduation programme, internship, training, part time or full time job related to my qualifications. LANGUAGE SKILLS: Polish (mother tongue), English (fluent), Danish (starting). IT-EXPERIENCE: AutoCAD, MOUSE DHI, MS Windows, MS Office. CONTACT: EMAIL: monikasysiak@gmail.com Tel: +45 50 43 70 43 SPOUSE: Clotilde IMBERT FROM: France SEEKING WORK IN: Greater Copenhagen Qualification: Master of town planning and development and master of urban geography (Paris IVSorbonne) EXPERIENCE: 5 years in field of town planning and development: - Coordinator in urban project in a semi-public company: supervised a major urban project in Paris area (coordination of studies, acquisition of lands, worked with Planning Development of the Town Council, architects, developers to define the master plan and implement the project...); - Officer in research and consultancy firm (urban diagnosis, environmental impact assessments, inhabitants consultation...). LOOKING FOR: A job in urban project field: planning department of Town Council or consultancy firm in town planning, environment and sustainable development, architecture firm, real estate development company. 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QUALIFICATION: Managers Secretary, hands on, reliable, structured, self reliant, social, team player). LOOKING FOR: Secretary job. LANGUAGE SKILLS: Dutch, Danish, English, German, French, Italian. IT EXPERIENCE: MS Office ( Word, Excel), Outlook, SAP. CONTACT: jenniferbouma@ hotmail.com SPOUSE: Jik Boom FROM: The Netherlands SEEKING WORK IN: Copenhagen QUALIFICATION: Teacher EXPERIENCE: CELTA (Cambridge Certificate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) see also Linkedin profile http://dk.linkedin.com/in/jikboom) LOOKING FOR: Work in the area of teaching (English), proofreading (English) and translation (English/Dutch - Dutch/English) LANGUAGE SKILLS: Dutch, English, French, German, Danish IT EXPERIENCE: MS Office (Powerpoint, Word, Excel) CONTACT: jikboom@yahoo.com, Tel: +45 42129175 SPOUSE: Mayurika Saxena Sheth FROM: India/USA SEEKING WORK IN: Copenhagen & nearby areas, Greater Copenhagen QUALIFICATION: MCA, PGDMM(MATERIALS), B.SC (COMPUTERS) CERTIFICATIONS: CSTE, CSQA, GREEN BELT SIX SIGMA, TSP/PSP. EXPERIENCE: Eleven years of software development work/IT/BUSINESS experience with prestigious organizations (onsite and offshore): Microsoft, General Electric, Primus Telecommunications (AUSTRALIA), CitiFINANCIAL(USA), ISS and Imany. LOOKING FOR: Full Time Job in IT, Management, Consulting or Business/Financial Field. LANGUAGE SKILLS: ENGLISH fluent, HINDI fluent, DANISH AND SPANISH (Beginner). IT EXPERIENCE: Testing tools like Test Director, Quality Center, Access Server, Product Studio, Polyspace Analysis, .NET testing, Web Page testing, Electronic Appliances testing, development in Winrunner, ASP, HTML, JavaScript, VBScript, Jscript, Oracle, Cold Fusion, SQL, Access, COM/DCOM, MTS, Siebel as well as UNIX, Tuxedo, C, PL/SQL, VB.Net/ ASP .Net, VB.Net. C#. CONTACT: mayurika.s@gmail.com Tel: +45 7169 5401

PARTNERS:

12- 18 October 2012 SPOUSE: Lorena Augusta Moreira FROM: Brazil SEEKING WORK IN: Great Copenhagen QUALIFICATION: Interior Designer. EXPERIENCE: + 3 of experience with interior design and sales of furniture and decoration products. LOOKING FOR: Position in an Organization/Company in the fields of: Interior design, lay-out and organization of vitrines, sales and assistance management. IT EXPERIENCE: Microsoft office (word, excel, outlook, access and power-point) access to internet. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English (fluent), Portuguese (native) and Spanish (pre-intermediate). CONTACT: lorena-augusta@hotmail.com, Tel: + 45 52177084

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SPOUSE: Shilpa Lingaiah FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Copenhagen, Aarhus, Odense and nearby areas of the mentioned cities. QUALIFICATION: PG Diploma in Obstetrics and Gynaecology (JSS University, India); Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (RGUHS, India). Danish agency for international education has assessed the above qualification and corresponds to Danish Master’s degree in Health Sciences. LOOKING FOR: Research related to health science, jobs in pharmaceutical industry or new challenging career opportunities. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English(fluent written and spoken), Enrolled for Danish language classes, Indian languages(Kannada and Hindi). IT EXPERIENCE: MS Office. CONTACT: drshilpalingaiah@gmail.com Tel: +4552742859

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SPOUSE: Maihemutijiang Maimaiti FROM: China SEEKING WORK IN: Aarhus area, Denmark QUALIFICATION: M.Sc. In Computer Science, Uppsala University, Sweden; Bachelor of Engineering in Computer Science, Southwest University. LOOKING FOR: IT jobs. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Chinese, Uyghur. IT EXPERIENCE: 1 year experience in Java programming and modelling in VDM++. CONTACT: mehmudjan@live.se SPOUSE: Katarzyna Szkaradek FROM: Poland SEEKING WORK IN: Mental hospitals, voluntary(Ngo) organisations, kindergartens, nurseries, babysitting QUALIFICATION: Ma in Psychology (2008), post graduate studies in psychotherapy (4th year/ 5 year). EXPERIENCE: I am a highly motivated and creative individual with excellent communication skills. From January 2010 till August 2010 I worked independly in private practice. For the last 2 years (January ,2009 -October, 2010) I worked with children (also with special needs -Autism, Asperger, Down syndrome etc) and their families as a psychologist. My duties included organizing games, monitoring children’s development , consulting teachers and parents where appropriate and providing individual therapy. For the last 10 years I was member of NGO organisation and I was a volunteer in Israel, Italy, Portugal and Romania. LOOKING FOR: Internship in mental hospitals, part – time or full time jobs in kindergartens, nurseries, job as a babysitter, voluntary job in hospitals. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English–advance level (C1), Danish – (module 3 /module 5), Polish-native speaker IT EXPERIENCE: MS Windows, basic MS Office, Internet. CONTACT: szkasienka@gmail.com Tel: 50828802 SPOUSE: Isaac P Thomas FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: East Juthland preferably Århus QUALIFICATION: Bachelor of Engineering (Computer Science). EXPERIENCE: Process Consulting, Quality Assurance, CMMI, ISO, Quality Audit, Process Definition, Software testing, software development, data analysis, best practice sharing, quality gap analysis and “sharepoint” expertise. LOOKING FOR: Process Consulting, Quality Assurance, CMMI, ISO, Quality Audit, Process Definition LANGUAGE SKILLS: Danish beginner, English, Malayalam, Hindi and Tamil. IT EXPERIENCE: 8 years experience in IT Industry in software quality assurance, software quality control, software development. CONTACT: isaacpthomas@gmail.com, Tel: +4552225642 SPOUSE: Debjani Nandy Biswas FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Would like to join in kindergarten, School teacher in English, official work in English. QUALIFICATION: B.A., M.A in English literature and language (American, European and Indian). EXPERIENCE: Temporary school teacher in Bongaon, India and involved in social work (handicapped society). LOOKING FOR: A possibility in getting practical experiences in kindergarten or any international school, official work (administration) in English, voluntary work also. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Hindi, Sanskrit, Bengali, little Danish (currently learning). IT EXPERIENCE: Diploma in basic computer applications. CONTACT: debjaninb@gmail.com, Tel: +45 50219942. SPOUSE: DR TESSA KATE ANDERSON FROM: UK SEEKING WORK IN: University, education, research, social science, geography, GIS, spatial analysis, urban geography. EXPERIENCE: PhD from UCL (UK) in GIS and road safety, Assistant Professor at University of Canterbury, New Zealand for 3 years, Assistant Professor in GIS at University of Queensland for 1 year, Research Fellow at University of Hong Kong for 3 years. I have experience in project management and working in both the private and public sector. I have taught up to Masters level and have design courses and taught extensively. LOOKING FOR: Research, teaching, consultancy positions. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, French (small amount), Chinese (beginner), I am enrolled at Danish language school IT EXPERIENCE: ArcGIS, MapInfo, GeoDa, Global Mapper, GWR, Python, Image J, SPSS, Excel, Work, PowerPoint, Access, Dreamweaver, Adobe, SAS, open source GIS programmes. CONTACT: tessaanderson@gmail.com SPOUSE: Nina Chatelain FROM: Vancouver, BC, Canada SEEKING WORK IN: Midt - og syd jylland QUALIFICATION: BA courses in english and anthropology, certificate in desktop publishing and graphic design, internationally certified yoga teacher since 1999. EXPERIENCE: Over 7 years experience as the assistant to the director (what would correspond to a direktionssekretær position) at an international university museum where i also was seconded to act as the program administrator – a project management internal communications role – for the museum’s major renovation project. I acted as the director’s right hand and the museum’s communications hub where i had daily contact with the visiting public, community stakeholders, volunteers and students. I have earlier worked as an editor and writer in various capacities, as well as a desktop publisher/graphic designer. LOOKING FOR: An administrative role in a creative company that needs someone who can juggle a variety of projects and use excellent english writing and editing skills LANGUAGE SKILLS: English (mother tongue) and Danish (fluent comprehension-studieprøven / university entrance exam). IT EXPERIENCE: MS Office Package, PC and Apple, have earlier worked with various desktop publishing software, quick to learn new software and systems. CONTACT: nina.chatelain@gmail.com, Tel: +45 29707430

SPOUSE: Sucharita Reddy FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Anywhere in Denmark QUALIFICATION: Bachelor in Technology (Electrical Engineering) EXPERIENCE: 4+ years of professional experience in SAP ABAP & OO-ABAP programming for Material Management(MM), Plant Maintenance(PM), Document Management and Record Management System(DM/RM), Extended Warehouse Management (EWM) , Sales and Distribution(SD) and Finance (FI) modules. LOOKING FOR: Job opportunities in IT(technical or Functional),Consulting,Management or Business Field. LANGUAGE SKILLS: Proficient in English & Hindi. Danish(learning Intensive course) IT EXPERIENCE: SAP ABAP/4 technical skills include ABAP Programs (Dialog Programming, Standard and Interactive Reports), ALV Reporting, Smartforms, User Exit and Field Exit Development, Interfacing Data with external systems, Data conversions, Programming using BDC, ABAP/4 Workbench, Data Dictionary ,Batch Job management ,Workflows, Adobe Forms, Webdynpro, ABAP Objects CONTACT: sucharita17.reddy@gmail.com, Tel: 0045-5271184. SPOUSE: Dr Shivanee Shah FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Copenhagen QUALIFICATION: Homeopathic Medicine Doctor, Medical transcriptionsit, Medical auditor for medical insurances. EXPERIENCE: 5 years of experience of running own clinic, medical transcription, medical audits with national level scheme LOOKING FOR: Full time/part time opportunity with pharmaceutical company, as assistant doctor, medical transcription, medical bill audits for insurance companies, data entry related jobs. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Hindi, Danish class to commence shortly CONTACT: pranavdsc@yahoo.com. Tel: +45 71841109 SPOUSE: Anisha Kanjhlia FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Arhus in Teaching/Training/Administration/Media/Public Relations QUALIFICATION: Post Graduate in Advertising & Communication. EXPERIENCE: 6+ years of professional experience in Training, Customer Service, Promotions, Brand Marketing, Content Analysis and Team Management. Strong experience in planning and executing initiatives. Extensive training experience and influencing skills that will assist me in building a high potential, motivated and an effective team. Hands-on training in soft skills like crucial conversations and people management Branch Manager & Head of Training for Cosmo Aviation Training School in New Delhi, India. Proficient in analysing market trends to provide critical inputs for decision making and formulating training strategies. LOOKING FOR: Part time or full time in Aarhus. IT EXPERIENCE: Comfortable with all the basic computer knowledge like Excel, Word, Power Point, Internet browsing. CONTACT: anisha.feb@rediffmail.com, Tel: 4522305837 SPOUSE: Deepak Kumar Koneri FROM: India SEEKING WORK IN: Copenhagen QUALIFICATION: M.Sc in Electrical Engineering specialization in Embedded Systems (Jönköping, Sweden), B.Tech in Electrical and Electronics Engineering (Hyderabad, India). EXPERIENCE: Worked as Electrical Distribution Design Engineer in Electrical Consultant company for more than 2 years. I was responsible from the start of design definition phase till the implementation phase of individual project. LOOKING FOR: Full and part time job opportunity in Energy, Robust Electronics design, PCB Design, Thermal Analyst, Design & Modelling of power systems, power optimization, simulation and also in constructional, architectural consulting organization. LANGUAGE SKILLS: English (Fluent), Hindi (Mother Tongue), Swedish (Basic) and Danish(Basic, Currently learning). IT EXPERIENCE: MS-Office (word, Excel, Power point, Visio), CFD (Mentor Graphics FloTHERM, FloVENT, Noesis OPTIMUS, Electrical CAD, Assembly Programming (PIC 16f77, 8086,8051), WireMOM, Telelogic SDL-99, C and VHDL. CONTACT: konerideepak@gmail.com, Tel: 71561151

Denmark’s only English-language newspaper

THE COPENHAGEN POST SPOUSE EMPLOYMENT PAGE WHY: The Copenhagen Post wishes to help spouses looking for jobs in Denmark. We have on our own initiative started a weekly spouse job page in The Copenhagen Post, with the aim to show that there are already within Denmark many highly educated international candidates looking for jobs. If you are a spouse to an international employee in Denmark looking for new career opportunities, you are welcome to send a profile to The Copenhagen Post at aviaja@cphpost.dk and we will post your profile on the spouse job page when possible. Remember to get it removed in case of new job.

EMPLOYMENT

THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12 - 18 October 2012

Østerbro

I N T E R N AT I O N A L S C H O O L

SENCO – SpECial EduCatiON NEEdS COOrdiNatOr (50% pOSitiON)

Learninginternational Support Assistant – Part-time Grades 6-8 coPenhagen school is looKing The Resource at Copenhagen International School Positions: is inviting applications for the toDepartment fill the folloWing positions of Learning Support Assistant. This position is a temporary, part-time position (50%) and will start immediately and extend until end June 2013. There is the possibility that this position grade 1 teachers couldPre-Kindergarten, be combined. The work is paidKindergarten at an hourly rate. Thisand position does require the applicant to have a valid Danish work permit.

The successful applicants should be qualified teachers with a minimum of 2 years’ experience working within an early years programme. The position will start on August 1st 2012.

Qualifications: • A degree in education or related to the field of education We are looking for teachers who have knowledge and experience of the international Baccalaureate Primary years • Further qualifications in Special Education programme (iB PyP), and who: • Experience working with students who require learning support • can design effective and developmentally appropriate learning opportunities

• can demonstrate a track record of excellent classroom practice including in-depth understanding of differentiated instruction, second language acquisition andResponsibilities play based learning may include, but are not limited to: • Assisting in the preparation, implementation and supervision of resource student • have a strong work ethic and excellent organizational skills programming. • have a track record of being an effective collaborator and team player • Reinforcing organizational skills: providing immediate feedback, in order to promote the • have willingness and commitment to contribute to the development of the curriculum acquisition of academic goals. • have willingness and commitment to contribute to the greater school community • will demonstrate professionalism in its broadest sense • Supporting students with language based learning disabilities.

• •

Maintaining appropriate record keeping as outlined by the teachers and the resource coordinator/teacher. Kindergarten 1 assistants Working collaboratively as a memberand of thegrade educational team in the classroom and school.

The Kindergarten and Grade 1 teams are looking for additional Assistants to join the existing teams. The successful candidates should be qualified to work Applications should be made in writing, including a curriculum vitae and a cover letter including with children between the ages of 5 and 7 with a strong background and experience in early years’ education and with a minimum of two years of experience theyears names of threeThecurrent addresses). working in an early programme. position referees will start on(with Auguste-mail 1st 2012.

send applications addressed to the attention of Karen Watts, Director of Student Services at We are lookingPlease for early years’ educators who: karenwatts@cis.dk • have a caring and nurturing approach with children • are organized and demonstrate effective classroom practice Stockholmsgade 59 Hellerupvej 22-26 2100 Copenhagen Ø • have a strong work ethic 2900 Hellerup T +45 3946 3309 T +45 3946 3311 • have a track record of being an effective collaborator and team player www.cis.dk www.cis.dk • preferably have knowledge and experience of the International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programme. (IB PYP)

SUCCESS

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Østerbro International School • Præstøgade 17 • 2100 Copenhagen Ø • Tel.: +45 70 20 63 68 • E-mail: info@oeis.dk

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applyiNg fOr thE pOSitiON Applications should be made in writing, including a curriculum vitae and a covering letter highlighting your skills and experience in the areas listed above. please send applications to Nedzat asanovski via email na@oeis.dk. the closing date for applications is monday the 22nd of October and interviews will be held on the 25th-26th of October.

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CharaCtEriStiCS wE’rE lOOkiNg fOr: • An interest and commitment towards working with children who have special needs. • A psychologically minded individual who can consider difficulties from multiple perspectives and take into account reports from parents, teachers and students. • Excellent organization skills, in order to effectively manage the cases within the SSS. • Excellent communication skills, and the ability to build good working relationships with colleagues, parents and students. • English language proficiency • Contributes positively to the sense of community among staff, as well as the wider school community and promotes the vision of Østerbro International School. • Knowledge of the IB system would be preferential.

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QualifiCatiONS: The applicant should be a qualified teacher or educational psychologist with experience of working with special needs. primary rESpONSibilitiES: To head up our already established student support services (SSS). To work with teaching assistants to plan, and be involved with in class, and small group support to students. To liaise with other agencies (e.g. health and social care services, speech and language services, Copenhagen kommune) to ensure a coordinated care approach to each child accessing the SSS.

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We continue to grow. Want to join us? Being the global leader in the video surveillance industry, Milestone Systems sets the standard in video management technology and drives the video management software revolution for the future. We are an innovative, enthusiastic and open-minded team with offices across the globe. As a Marketing Creative Writer, you will be responsible for developing messaging documents for partner marketing tools and writing communication pieces including brochures, presentations, newsletters and website content. Your task will require a solid background of the English language, marketing writing, creativity, originality and comprehension of creating and using messaging documents. For more information, please contact Acting Head of Marketing Fred Wallberg at +45 88 300 300, or visit our website www.milestonesys.com to apply for the position. Interviews will be conducted on an ongoing basis, so send your application via our homepage as soon as possible. www.milestonesys.com

culture Culture

The Copenhagen Post cphpost.dk

12- 18 October 2012

Linn Lemhag Calendar Girls HHHHHH

JACOPO MARTINI

Scrap that calendar entry and arrange a date with the girls!

Who is … Thomas Rode?

hen ‘Calendar Girls’, the real-life story that became a movie and then a play, first released the rights for a finite number of amateur theatre groups to perform the play earlier this year, there was an international scramble that saw the Copenhagen Theatre Circle one of the lucky few selected to put on the play. Staged at the Krudttønden theatre in Østerbro − which boasts barely 100 seats, most of which were filled by women − it is not a stretch to say that the opening night audience became just as much a part of the Rylstone Yorkshire Women’s Institute, at which most of the action takes place, as the cast themselves. Despite the inevitable opening night script-stumbles and prop-fumbles, the cast were wonderfully in sync with one another, and alternated smoothly between the humorous (a hilarious Maureen Egerup as Jessie proclaiming stony-faced that she would not do “front-bottom” nudity) and the sombre (the uncomfortable silence when John Shennan takes off his hat to reveal a post-chemo bald head).

linn lemhag He is a 43-year-old TV cook, who is also the head chef at the Michelin-star restaurant Kong Hans Kælder in Copenhagen. It finally dawns on Tine Juul, Polly Wilson, Maureen Egerup and Vanessa Poole what they are expected to do

Dealing with the big C as subject matter isn’t easy. Memories of the shameless tear-inducing sentimentality of ‘A Walk to Remember’ and ‘My Sister’s Keeper’, mixed with the horrific morbidity of try-to-laugh comedies like ‘Funny People’, make it difficult to imagine how on earth something like ‘Calendar Girls’ works at all – and yet we seesaw from heartache to laughter, between the triumph of the Calendar Girls and Annie’s loss of the man that she loves. Yet not once are we asked to pity Annie, the heart-wrenching Sarah Cox, but instead her pain is set not

in contrast to, but in line with the dilemmas that each of her friends are facing. Each of the Calendar Girls, and even the repugnant WI dictator Marie (played by a wonderfully tight-lipped Debbie Taylor), are carrying pain behind their playful banter and well-worn fronts. Whether it’s the well to-do pushover with the cheating husband or the chavtastic preacher’s daughter with a broken heart, the actors carry each of these imperfect women with such care and compassion that each laugh they get is that much funnier because it is often-

times filled with real sorrow. We laugh because it’s real; the women on stage could be anyone of those sitting in the audience. When it came to the portion of the evening when the camera came on and the clothes came off, each woman took her turn to be photographed in varying degrees of nakedness, with household items used in creative ways as bodily cover-up (highlights included a plate of glazed muffins and two strategically placed teapots). Each revelation felt like a liberation, and not just for their characters, but for the women playing them as well.

The last scene, in which Annie finally makes a bittersweet farewell to her mourning, sent an audible intake of breath and collective sigh reverberating throughout the audience, followed by a rustling of makeshift tissues as people went to wipe their faces. Director Barry McKenna has succeeded where so many before him have failed – to be funny without mocking and to be serious without being trite. CTC’s ‘Calendar Girls’ walks the fragile line between laughter and sadness, because though it might be set in Yorkshire, that’s where it really takes place.

Lovísa Dröfn Hansdóttir

kgl

More success for ‘Armadillo’ Bizet’s brassy bombshell bombs a bit HHHHHH

Armadillo won the Critics’ Week Grand Prix at Cannes ... in 2010

henry butman Documentary wins an Emmy and makes the Puma-Britdoc shortlist

he Danish documentary ‘Armadillo’, which won a News & Documentary Emmy Award last week a full two years after its cinematic release in Denmark, is on a shortlist of nominees for the prestigious Puma-Britdoc prize. The prize, awarded by the non-profit Britdoc Foundation and PUMA Creative, is given to the documentary deemed most significant for its impact on society or the environment. Any documentary released since 2009 is eligible, and ‘Armadillo’ – which follows a squadron of Danish soldiers stationed at Armadillo, a combat base in Afghanistan – is on a shortlist of five films. The other four films are US-made docs ‘Bag It’ (2010),

‘Budrus’ (2009) and ‘Gasland’ (2010), and the Dutch doc ‘Weapon of War’ (2009). The winning film, which will be announced on November 13 in Berlin, will be awarded 50,000 euros. The jury is comprised of two actors (Danny Glover and Djimon Hounsou), film director Mira Nair (‘The Namesake’), Kumi Naidoo, the executive director of Greenpeace International, and British campaigner and socialite Jemima Khan. Last week ‘Armadillo’ won its Emmy in the category ‘Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Editing – Documentary and Long Form’, an award received by the film’s editor Per K Kirkegaard. It was one of its four nominations. Meanwhile, actress Sidse Babett Knudsen has received an International Emmy nomination for best actress for her role as prime minister Birgitte Nyborg in ‘Borgen’.

What happens in it? In each episode Rode invites two famous Danes (cuisine and celebrities seem to be his forte) to cook for him. Following his judgement, the loser has to do the dishes, while the winner sips champagne and chats with Rode. He might be the first chef to make a TV career without ever physically cooking anything on camera. Impressive! He seems to be modelling himself on Gordon Ramsay. Rode has confessed to flipping out on his employees in the past − in an open kitchen with an entire restaurant watching no less.

Carmen ention the name Carmen these days and many will think of the sultry Carmen Electra. But the original bombshell was most definitely Bizet’s Carmen in the opera of the same name. GuidOpera’s chamber production of the classic opera swaps the original’s setting of 1820s Seville for 1950s Cuba where Don José, a naïve Englishman, is seduced by the tantalising Carmen. However, her love is a fleeting one and she soon sets her eyes on another man. Voila: a love triangle! Staging Carmen as a chamber opera seems like a good idea because, as the director explained in his notes, it allows for more focus on the storyline and the complex characters. This is indeed true, but unfortunately some of the singers didn’t seem at ease with this intimacy. That’s not to say it was all bad. Guido Paevatalu, especially, delivered a good performance as Escamillo with a subtlety and charisma that was missing from some of the other singers. And while the acting wasn’t great, the direction suffered as well. It was often too extrava-

Where might I have seen him? If you’ve ever watched Kanal 5, you’ve probably glimpsed this silver fox or, at the very least, heard him. He’s the smartass commentator on the Danish version of ‘Celebrity Come Dine with Me’, where he mostly mocks the various D-listers and their feeble attempts at cooking. He also has his own programme that just started on October 1.

Yikes! He’s even thrown rude guests out of the place, but only after yelling at them. He doesn’t seem to care that they have just spent 3,000 kroner on a meal for two.

The Spanish sultry senorita has become a hot Havanan hoochie

gant for such a small stage, and at times a little too camp. The star of the show was the music. Changing the setting of the opera from Seville to Cuba actually worked well and allowed for some very interesting arrangements performed by a small band consisting of a piano, accordion, double bass and guitar. Having such a small band suited the intimate atmosphere of the chamber opera perfectly, and the accordion paired with the guitar made for a very Latin feel. All in all, the chamber opera failed to do justice to such a popular and groundbreak-

ing opera. The music doesn’t disappoint, and the storyline is interesting, but many of the performers seemed somewhat lost and didn’t manage to fully engage the audience. That being said, it was entertaining, and those who are generally not fans of big, theatrical opera productions might have found this a good middle ground between opera and theatre. This intense chamber version of Carmen played at Operaen Takkelloftet on Thursday October 4 and Saturday October 6. The full opera will return to the KGL’s stage in January 2013.

So he’s got a bit of a temper then? Evidently, though he seems to have calmed down quite a bit in the past few years. Maybe it’s because he’s letting his aggression out somewhere other than the workplace, as Rode has in the last few years become a fitness junkie, again a bit like Mr Ramsay. He works out every day and doesn’t eat starch, sugar or carbohydrates, so those bulging muscles under his chef ’s jacket are not an optical illusion! A body-builder chef, that’s a first! It’s hard to imagine what a man who only eats salads and steak is doing running a French gourmet kitchen. His reason for never cooking onscreen might not be such a big mystery after all!

19 Treasure trove in the attic: Tekno, tekno, tekno tekno! DENMARK THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

12 - 18 October 2012

ERIC BRYAN The Danish scale model toy company whose creations delighted children, and then adults, all over the world

ICTURE THE scene. Your Danish partner’s grandfather has died, and you’ve gamely volunteered to help clean out their loft. It’s dark and damp and so far all you’ve found are old clothes and a pile of Billed Bladets from 1984. But something told you that this forage might be worth your while – after all, isn’t that always the way on ‘Trash in the Attic’? And then, in the final corner, all your dreams come true. In a cardboard box, carefully wrapped in bubblewrap, are close to a hundred toy vehicles, all in their original boxes. You shine your torch and see the

name ‘Tekno’, which you repeat four times for good effect. You thought Danish toys began and ended with Lego. You were wrong and you’ve just stumbled across a goldmine. Forget trash, this is a treasure trove. The Tekno scale model toy company began life in 1935 as a brand name of Dansk Legetøjs Industri (Danish Toy Industry). The latter was founded in 1928 by Danish plumber Andreas Siegumfeldt, who began by making toys in his basement in the Vanløse district of Copenhagen. Under the Tekno name, the company started to produce tinplate cars, fire engines, and other vehicles. When Tekno was confronted with the wartime tinplate ban in 1940, the maker nimbly switched to manufacturing wooden toys. Tekno commenced production of its celebrated diecast models in the postwar period. The lingering tin shortage (and the scarcity of other metals as well) after the war led to Tekno

turning to a zinc-based alloy for diecast manufacture. The alloy, which was made up of zinc, aluminium, magnesium and copper, was called zamac − an acronym of the metals. These early diecast toys included a number of Dodge and Ford lorries, emergency vehicles and aircraft. Tekno grew and formed a partnership with another Danish toymaker, H Lange, in 1949. A year later, the company created an export division, Tekno Svenska AB, and began shipping its models to the Netherlands, Germany, the US and the UK. As the company completely wound down its production of tinplate toys in the mid-1950s, the export of its diecast toys flourished. Tekno’s models of Volkswagen vans in various fleets proved especially popular. Toymaker Kirk Production bought H Lange in 1960, and the success of Tekno’s model autos continued to grow. The 1960s was the golden age of diecast toys and models, dur-

The founder, Andreas Siegumfeldt, was a part-time Walt Disney impersonator

Factfile 1 | Recent results of a Tekno vehicle auction •

No. 720 Opel Rekord: 1,773kr

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No. 723 Mercedes Benz 180: 1,680kr

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No. 810 Volvo Amazon: 2,425kr

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No. 822 Volvo PV544: 1,307kr

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No. 823 Ford Taunus 17M: 1,773kr

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No. 825 Volvo P1800: 1,587kr

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No. 827 Saab 96: 1,680kr

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No. 828 Volkswagen 1500: 1,400kr

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No. 830 Volvo Amazon Estate: 2,053kr

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No. 926 Jaguar E-Type: 1,120kr

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No. 934 Toyota 2000GT: 1,213kr

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No. 405 Volkswagen Van: 2,613kr

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No. 406 Volkswagen Pick-Up: 3,733kr

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No. 415 Ford Taunus Van: 3,173kr “Don’t tell me you threw away the boxes!”

ing which British makers such as Corgi, Dinky, and Matchbox became famous the world over. Tekno’s sales peaked at over one million models per year during this decade. Approximately twothirds of these sales were made up of exports. Siegumfeldt, Tekno’s founder, died in 1969, and within a year, Kirk Production had begun producing the models under its own brand name. There followed a period of uncertainty in which the company was beset by financial problems, leading to it becoming insolvent in 1972. Vanmin BV, a Dutch importer of Tekno goods, then bought the Danish company. By 1974, the company had been renamed Tekno Toys BV and relocated to Delft in the Netherlands. Its target customers were no longer children but adult collectors, and the models were more detailed as a result. To underline its focus, it dropped the ‘Toys’ from its name in 1989, and today Tekno Holland, as it is often called to differentiate it from the original Danish Tekno, is owned by the Van Buuren company and headquartered in Maasland. Danish Tekno models unsurprisingly continue to be highly sought-after by collectors of classic diecast (see Factfile 2 for a list of classic models). These Tekno pieces, especially those in mint condition and in their original boxes, command high valuations from bidders through such houses as Vectis Auctions Ltd in England. For an idea of the current health of the Danish Tekno market, in Factfile 2 are the results of a very recent Vectis Tekno model vehicle auction of a Swiss collection (all of the models were in mint condition and in their original boxes). It can be a serious business (and an investment) collecting these Danish jewels. However, some items in this auction closed for more modest sums, such as a shiny red No. 724 Opel Kadett in glorious condition, which sold for only 560kr. Models that don’t have their original packaging, and/or are in less than mint condition, are generally pretty affordable. And it is worth bearing in mind, both as a buyer and a seller, that models in poor condition also have a price, as there are many collectors looking for items they can lovingly restore. Creating a collection of original Tekno models is a way to commemorate and preserve Danish workmanship. A collection such as this also honours periods of classic motoring, and the golden age of diecast toys when Tekno was a major Danish exporter, with its models famed and beloved amongst children and adults around the world.

The Volvo model: durable, dependable, a little bit dull

“I’m Kris Kristofferson in ‘Convoy’!” “Get your hands off that son, it will be worth millions one day.”

Factfile 2 | Classic Tekno models •

The Volvo Viking lorry as a tanker truck, auto transporter, low loader, dairy truck, removals van, timber carrier, tipper and more.

•

The Volvo Express lorry, both articulated and standard, ranging from fire engines to refrigerated trucks to dropside lorries and fresh-produce trucks.

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The Volvo F88 and F89 transport lorries, plus various Volvo buses.

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Scania-Vabis cement trucks, transport lorries and tankers.

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The Scania CR-76 bus, some of which have labels advertising BP or Jolly Cola.

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Scandinavian auto models include the Saab 93 and 96, the Volvo PV544, Amazon, Amazon estate car, the P1800 (remember the car Roger Moore drove in ‘The Sain’t?), the 144, and 164.

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Other auto models include NSU, Alfa Romeo, Austin, Mercedes, Opel, MG, Ford, Jaguar and others.

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Vespa scooters, some with sidecars, as well as Indian and Harley Davidson motorbikes.

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Airliner models, such as the Swissair Caravelle, the SAS livery, the DC-7C propeller airliner, jet fighters including the F-100 Super Sabre, and WWII bombers and fighters.

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A range of 1:87th scale plastic autos, dollhouse furniture, figures and games.

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Building sets akin to those of Meccano. Marketed as Ingeniørsæt, or ‘Engineering Set’, they feature green flatiron pieces, orange pulleys and wheels, and brass nuts and bolts. Some sets come with electric motors and batteries to provide power to various creations that could be constructed from the set.

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